Material grinding in the aerated concrete production

We have briefly considered the grinding process at enterprises following industries: minerals extraction and processing, cement production and coal grinding for thermal power plants.  We will consider the material grinding process in the aerated concrete production in this article.

There are more than 9 large plants produce building gas-concrete blocks in Ukraine today. All enterprises of this industry use single-chamber tube ball mills, as the grindable equipment. As a rule, these mills have 10 meters in length and 2.5 meters in diameter. The mill inner drum is protected by rubber armor plates with small lifters („waves”). In addition to Ukrainian aerated concrete producers, Energosteel Company supplies grinding balls to more than thirty companies of this industry located in the CIS and near abroad.

40 mm steel grinding balls use as grinding media for aerated concrete production and 30 mm grinding balls sometimes use in addition. This is due to the fact that sand grinds in ball mills. Sand has a fine fraction, but very abrasive and hard. Grinding media operate in cascade mode „for abrasion”. That’s why the grinding balls with surface hardness at least 64HRC and 45HRC at 0.5R depth (the fourth hardness group according to DSTU 3499-97 / DSTU 8538: 2015) use to achieve grinding quality and reduce grinding media specific consumption. Recall, the grinding media cost is fully included in the cost of finished products. Let’s note, only one Ukrainian aerated concrete producer still uses iron cylpebs as grinding media. Energosteel Company experts have negotiations about the industrial tests providing for the cast iron cylpebs replacement on steel grinding balls produced by Energosteel. Our experts guarantee, steel grinding balls use will give you the following:

• Reduction the grinding media specific consumption per ton of produced products. As practice shows, the specific consumption decrease from 25% to 40% and it significantly covers the difference in price.
• Reduction the electricity consumption per ton of products. Energy savings range from 8% to 10%.
• Mills productivity increasing by improving the grinding quality of raw materials.
• Reduction the mill loading rate by grinding media maintaining the previously achieved productivity and grinding quality.
• Reduction the time and costs for mill maintenance (gratings cleaning, grinding media loading, etc.).
• Warehouse stock optimization.

Energosteel Company specialists have conducted many industrial tests on using 30-40 mm grinding balls the fifth hardness group (DSTU 3499-97 / DSTU 8538: 2015)  for the many years experience of cooperation with aerated concrete producers as in Ukraine as in abroad countries. All tests showed the harder grinding media use leads to the following:

• grinding media specific consumption decrease by 18-27%;
• grinding fineness become better and more stable;
• energy saving increase by 12-15%;
• grinding media warehouse stocks optimization;
• reduction the work on ball mill additional loading by grinding media.

The grinding process specificity at these enterprises is automatic devices use (we’ll tell you about them in our next articles) for loading grinding media into a mill. It is necessary, the grinding balls should be perfectly smooth and clearly conform to the geometric parameters prescribed in the regulatory state standards for these automatic devices proper operation. Grinding balls produced by Energosteel Company fully meet the existing standards requirements and can be used in automatic devices for loading grinding media into mills.

Let’s sum up. Energosteel Company specialists boldly recommend for aerated concrete producers use as grinding media the 30 – 40 mm steel grinding balls the fifth hardness group (DSTU 3499-97 / DSTU 8538: 2015) produced by Energosteel. We can say with pride, more than 70% of Ukrainian aerated concrete slabs have produced by using Energosteel grinding balls.