Static structure analysis of 5000tpd Rotary cement kiln using ANSYS Mechanical APDL

Abstract

Rotary cement kiln is regarded as the heart of cement manufacture in any cement plant widely used to convert raw material into clinker. The capacity of a plant is determined by the production in the kiln whose sizes can be very large to handle higher production capacities of as much as 10000 tonnes per day (tpd) of raw meal to be processed. The ultimate cement quality is determined at the kiln. The varied physical process operations occurring and the equipment's complex construction with required strength necessitates in-depth analysis of static structural aspects for optimized efficiency in performance.

In this paper, a 5m diameter 72m length kiln is designed in Pro-E to determined structural total weight being an assembly of components. Its then modeled and analyzed in ANSYS using Mechanical apdl being a statically indeterminate system where kiln stresses distribution status on the cylinder shell is difficult to obtain through general analytical solution methods.  Following the analyzed results, a relevant conclusion is given where the analysis results would be useful in design of rotary kiln cylinder optimization for excellent performance and scholarly work.

Keywords; Rotary kiln, Finite element analysis, von-mises stress, tyre.