Rapid production of carbon steel slag based-structural clay product using dry mixing integrated with uniaxial compaction process

Abstract

The rapid growth of iron and steel production have led to the increment of solid wastes from both iron and steel making industry such as carbon steel slag waste. Hence, in this project, carbon steel slag waste was re-processed to develop structural clay product via a rapid production route, encompassing of dry mixing and uniaxial compaction process. From the study, as carbon steel slag added was increased to 60 wt.%, apparent porosity and water absorption increased, while compressive strength decreased due to higher porosity of the clay product. Meanwhile, when carbon steel slag was reduced to 40 wt.%, a higher total percentage of anorthite and wollastonite crystals were formed in the clay product, leading to higher compressive strength of the clay product. The optimized composition of structural clay product was 40 wt.% carbon steel slag - 60 wt.% ball clay (sintered at 1200°C). Although the rapid production route was successful, upon comparison with commercial structural clay product, we found that the properties are still inferior to the commercial products.