A Discussion on Stability of Mg-Al-spinel Crown of Glass Melters

In order to understand the failure mechanism of magnesia-alumina spinel crown of glass melters,a discussion on the stability of Mg-Al-spinel crown of glass melters was given in this paper.The discussion focused on the weight balance in the crown arch made of spinel or silica bricks,the creep of spinel crown bricks at high temperatures,the thermal stress distribution in crown bricks as well as at brick joints,and the displacement behavior of crown arch during heat-up of glass melter.It is believed that the tangential stress in spinel crown is much higher than that in silica crown due to the large differenee in their densities,and that the thermal stresses in the crown brick result in opening of a part of the brickto-brick joints at the cold side of the crown,and increase of the tangential stress needed for balancing the weight of the crown.Both defect migration in lattice or along grain boundary and viscous flow in glass phase at grain boundary contribute to the creep of crown bricks at high temperatures.The creep of the matrix of spinel brick is more significant than that of coarse grains because impurities,such as silica and calcia,are concentrated in it.For keeping the crown stable during heat-up period it is important to adjust properly the horizontal positions of each skew brick as temperature increasing based on correctly evaluating the thermal expansion according to the thermal expansion coefficient of the crown brick.