Research Group on Porous Meso-mosaic Texture Sinter in ISIJ was established from 2001 to 2004 fiscal years to overcome difficulties to use the great amount of goethite in sintering and at the same time to improve the sinter quality. Especially, since the beginning of the present research project the ratio of Marra Mamba goethitic ore was considered to increase rapidly, and the amount of sinter necessary for the Japanese integrated steel industries was thought hard to be produced satisfactorily, because Marra Mamba ore having high combined water content and high porosity was expected unsuitable for sintering. Therefore, the method of using goethite had been studied and the combination with low slag ratio important for melting behavior of goethite was investigated.
Each university had been engaged in basic research such as granulation, agglomeration, evaluation of reaction in a blast furnace to propose a new process for “porous meso-mosaic texture sinter” which was anticipated simultaneously to realize high strength and high reducibility under the conditions of low slag and high goethite ratio in sintering.
By combining these basic researches, the theory of agglomeration and the engineering foundation for raw material/sintering/blast furnace process were discussed and a new process for “porous meso-mosaic texture sinter” based on improving granulation process of raw material was searched. As a result, proposed was the MEBIOS (Mosaic Embedding Iron Ore Sintering) method which involved arranging dense pre-granulated pellets (firing cured bed) in a sinter induction bed with a raw material composition capable of forming a suitable void network under normal sintering conditions.