Abstract
Iron making feedstock degradation can results in losses and process stability variation. Understanding the effects of handling has been a topic of interest for the iron ore producers as fines generation and breakage occurring in transportation impact the efficiency of the ironmaking process. In the late 90’s Corem developed a drop test procedure for iron ore pellets to evaluate their resistance to mechanical stresses happening in transportation. This test showed improved interpretation of results on pellets against a classical Tumble test. In the context of the GHG reduction goals of the iron and steel industry, some changes in raw material are expected. This brings back interest for drop test for studies on typical material such as pellet, lumps and sinter, for which the representativity of the drop test is not well known yet; or on alternative products, for which the resistance to mechanical stresses occurring in transportation is also not known. This paper reviews Corem’s drop test, compares the degradation of some ironmaking feedstock and finally discusses the test interpretation. Results show that different materials have a wide range of strength resistance to drop, the strongest being well indurated pellets and the weakest, the sinter. The drop test could then be used to compare different material strength to handling. Prediction of the absolute number of fines generated from production to end use is still more challenging. The drop test can be used to support monitoring of material strength and thus product quality.