Kalenborn do Brasil: Abrasion-resistant steel tubes protect against iron ore

Iron ore is a key raw material which is extracted as rock from ore mines. Various industrial processing steps refine the ore till it is in the form of pressed pellets. It is in this form that the ore is used for the manufacture of steel. Our customer is the world’s leading producer of iron ore pellets. Right from the founding of Kalenborn do Brasil 15 years ago, the company has been supplying the producer with wear protection solutions for various pieces of plant.

In the course of processing iron ore, the raw material is transported via pipeline to a milling system. The iron ore granules have an average diameter of 0.4 mm. Under 3 bars of pressure, about 2500 m³ of rock are fed through the piping per hour.

This results in heavy wear. The pipes in the old system needed to be replaced after three years. The customer turned to Kalenborn hoping for a reliable solution with a greater lifespan. For this reason, we designed completely new steel pipes in the production hall at Kalenborn do Brasil and lined them with KALOCER. All the adapter sections – whether concentric or eccentric – were reinforced with ABRESIST and KALCOR. The combination of these materials ensures high resistance to abrasion – and thanks to excellent properties for allowing a good flow of materials, it is especially well suited for pipelines.

The benefit of our wear protection lies in the lifespan of the products. Our lined piping system can withstand this environment six times longer than the previous plastic-lined solution. This wear protection solution made its debut in 2011. Since then we have installed more than 280 tonnes of ceramic lining of this nature.