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I know the coke oven gets coal and the blast furnace gets ore. I was wondering which cars go from where to which side first and type from the coke oven to the blast furnace then the electric arc furnace. I am talking about which cars then order and where to after. I have a complete steel mill built from when they where on sale also but the order and which cars is used is baffling it really is not posted online. so which which cars and where to and from first? plus how is the coke oven fed? rear or front? I also have a sintering plant that was scratch built and it has a tar loading station that feeds a asphalt company. I made this model patterned after the us gary Indiana steel mill east of Chicago weathered and all.
I am also wondering how the blast furnace is fed with cars it goes under and around the side is there a real order there?
Now we know what happened to the Tin Man and his family after they left Oz.
thanks to both of you but this shows the cars around the blast furnace mostly. I neEd to know if the cars go to the side first or under on the blaST FURNACE AND WITCH ONES FROM OR TO THE COKE OVEN FIRST AND OF COURSE THE ORDER OF THE ELECTRIC FURNACE AND USUAL CARS TO AND FROM IT.
I know the coke oven gets coal and the blast furnace gets ore.
and the blast furnace gets coke/coal and limestone.
I was wondering which cars go from where to which side first and type from the coke oven to the blast furnace then the electric arc furnace. I am talking about which cars then order and where to after. I have a complete steel mill built from when they where on sale also but the order and which cars is used is baffling it really is not posted online. so which which cars and where to and from first?
I would sugest buying Dean Freitag's book on steel mills, he covers the whole process in detail. Railroad cars are pretty much at the beginning and end of the process and alot of the movement of 'stuff' in the middle is done by specialized cars that are different from conventional rail cars or is done by processess or conveyor belts.
plus how is the coke oven fed? rear or front?
Neither, from the top. Coal is dumped into a pit where it is conveyored to a bunker on top of the oven. A "larry", a self propelled hopper, runs on the top of the ovens and dumps the coal into each of the ovens from the top. On one side of the ovens is a specialized machine that contains rams. On the other side a specialized machine, a hot coke car,a sort of self propelled super hopper car operates. When the coke in a particular oven is done, the pull the hot coke car up to the output side of the oven and the ram to the other side. they open the oven doors and the ram pushes the near white hot coke out of the oven into the hot coke car. The coke car takes the coke to a qunching tower where tons of water are dumped on the coke to lower the temperature below the combustion level. Then the hot coke car dumps the coke into a large bin where it finished cooling. Later it is loaded by conveyor or clamshell bucket into railroad hopper cars.
Similarly the blast furnace is also fed from the top.
Look at photos of real or model blast furnaces and you'll see either a large conveyor or skip hoist on one side. Raw materials (iron ore*, coke, lime, other additives) are dumped in a stockpile nearby and fed to the furnace via these conveyances.
The molten iron/steel from the furnace is loaded in the attached structure into specialized hot metal bottle cars. Slag (the removed waste impurities) is also loaded into specialized ladle cars. (See photos included above of a model blast furnace.)
The molten slag is hauled away and dumped in a pit. Sometime after it has cooled it may be recovered and crushed. Slag was popular for a long time as track ballast and/or fill and may be shipped out of the crushing plant in hoppers.
The molten steel is brought to a casting mill to be cast into ingots (large solid blocks of steel). Or, instead brought to an oxygen furnace for more refining and then cast into ingots. Recycled steel scrap can be added to the process in the oxygen furnace.
The ingots are later moved from the casting house in other specialized cars to the various rolling and finishing mills where the ingots are re-heated and using lots of rollers, turned into plate, sheet (coils), beams and other specialized shapes like rail.
*You also mentioned sinter plant. Sintering is a process used to upgrade or prepare raw ore for the furnace. Raw ore, limestone and coke is fed into the sinter plant and heated. This drives off some impurities and heats the materials into a lumpy mass. This then gets cooled and crushed into a consistent size for the furnace and sent to the stockpile. Then it goes to the furnace.
Coal -> Coke Oven -> Coke
Coke, Iron Ore, Lime -> Sinter Plant -> Sinter
Sinter, Coke -> Blast Furnace -> Molten Steel, Slag
Molten Steel, Scrap Steel -> Oxygen Furnace -> Caster -> Ingots
Ingots -> Rolling/Finishing Mills -> Plate, Beams, Sheet (Coils), Rail, Wire, etc.
Sheet -> Tube Mill -> Pipe
thanks chris I will use your information for running sessions this year and trust me on sintering plants the photo I found was one of a kind. I also read that sintering plants provide power for the facilities so I have modeled for this purpose also. there is just 1 thing that I have not gathered what are the side tubes on the walthers blast furnace used for,I am talking about the 3 plastic tube group with a small spout above the track on the outside and to from it what is the order? I am learning here so bear with me the details are killer and I have and want realistic operations. I also have another handmade model just like the sintering plant picture I found online and that is landfills for my heavy industry railroad plus I have a chemical factory,velsicol chemical was a heavy polluter so it is real. I also have a good sized refinery before the epa days so oil is scattered around the area. I would also suggest for anyone to go to model railroad swap meets and get themselves educated on the good months and supply there at that moment otherwise the cost can get high I have mostly finished mine with reasonable cost and information I have attained here and of course experience. I also kit bashed a Chicago l and painted cars that were a shape of 70,s l cars that were pretty close for minimal cost.
I want to add 1 more thing my layout is decent sized and I had zero help just me myself and I to do it and of course this site and a learning curve and using model railroad swap meets to keep costs down and my imagination and thinking outside the box. 14 winters with maybe 3 to go to be fully detailed and everything functioning like smoke moving parts automated buildings etc I engineered lights in already and they work. this is a great hobby and we all can learn from each other and those swap meets and to from them to keep costs down and keeping up afterwards with whom has your remaining needed things on sale and doing your homework on what is actually a real deal out there.
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