A method of treating refractory-lined equipment includes accessing an interior of the refractory-lined equipment with an equipment repair apparatus, wherein the equipment repair apparatus includes a robotic arm and one or more end effectors coupled to an end of the robotic arm, inspecting refractory material that lines an inner wall of the refractory-lined equipment with a first end effector coupled to the end of the robotic arm, removing damaged refractory material from the inner wall with a second end effector coupled to the end of the robotic arm, removing one or more anchors from the inner wall with a third end effector coupled to the end of the robotic arm, and installing new refractory material on the inner wall with a fourth end effector coupled to the end of the robotic arm.

An abnormality detection method of detecting abnormality of a blast furnace from tuyere images shot by cameras installed in vicinities of a plurality of tuyeres of the blast furnace includes: collecting, in a time-series manner, representative brightness vectors defined by representative brightnesses determined based on brightness values of respective pixels for each of the tuyeres image previously shot by the cameras at a same time; extracting a principal component vector by performing principal component analysis on the representative brightness vectors collected in the time-series manner; calculating, as an evaluation value, a length of a normal line drawn in a direction of the principal component vector from the representative brightness vector collected from the tuyere images shot by the cameras at the same time during an operation; and detecting the abnormality of the blast furnace by comparing the evaluation value with a predetermined threshold.

An abnormality detection method of detecting abnormality of a blast furnace from tuyere images shot by cameras installed in vicinities of a plurality of tuyeres of the blast furnace includes: collecting, in a time-series manner, representative brightness vectors defined by representative brightnesses determined based on brightness values of respective pixels for each of the tuyeres image previously shot by the cameras at a same time; extracting a principal component vector by performing principal component analysis on the representative brightness vectors collected in the time-series manner; calculating, as an evaluation value, a length of a normal line drawn in a direction of the principal component vector from the representative brightness vector collected from the tuyere images shot by the cameras at the same time during an operation; and detecting the abnormality of the blast furnace by comparing the evaluation value with a predetermined threshold.

A furnace stave comprising a plurality of internal channels or conduits for circulating cooling fluid through the stave; an inlet and an outlet channel associated with each internal channel or conduit; wherein one of the internal channels or conduits is disposed in a protrusion from the stave.

A powdery composition based on silica for ceramic welding, in particular by projection, comprising from 10 to 90% of a phase of siliceous particles comprise at least 80% by weight of cristobalite and at most 15% by weight of tridymite, based on the total weight of the composition, from 90 to 10% by weight of conventional additives forming a binding phase, based on the total weight of the composition, said siliceous particles having a d.sub.50 comprised between 350 and 800 μm, preferably between 400 and 500 μm.

A powdery composition based on silica for ceramic welding, in particular by projection, comprising from 10 to 90% of a phase of siliceous particles comprise at least 80% by weight of cristobalite and at most 15% by weight of tridymite, based on the total weight of the composition, from 90 to 10% by weight of conventional additives forming a binding phase, based on the total weight of the composition, said siliceous particles having a d.sub.50 comprised between 350 and 800 μm, preferably between 400 and 500 μm.

A spray material for hot and dry spray application with improved corrosion resistance, and a hot and dry spray application method with improved corrosion resistance. A hot and dry spray application method comprises pressure-feeding a mixture comprising a refractory material and a binder, toward a spraying nozzle via a pipe, and adding water to the mixture at a distal end of the spraying nozzle to apply a spray under a hot condition. The mixture contains magnesium limestone having a particle size of 0.075 mm to less than 1 mm, in an amount of 10 mass % to 50 mass %, in 100 mass % of a total amount of the refractory material and the binder. The content of magnesium limestone having a particle size of less than 0.075 mm in 100 mass % of the total amount of the refractory material and the binder is 35 mass % or less (including 0).

A spray material for hot and dry spray application with improved corrosion resistance, and a hot and dry spray application method with improved corrosion resistance. A hot and dry spray application method comprises pressure-feeding a mixture comprising a refractory material and a binder, toward a spraying nozzle via a pipe, and adding water to the mixture at a distal end of the spraying nozzle to apply a spray under a hot condition. The mixture contains magnesium limestone having a particle size of 0.075 mm to less than 1 mm, in an amount of 10 mass % to 50 mass %, in 100 mass % of a total amount of the refractory material and the binder. The content of magnesium limestone having a particle size of less than 0.075 mm in 100 mass % of the total amount of the refractory material and the binder is 35 mass % or less (including 0).

The furnace of the present invention includes a body of a furnace having a cylindrical shape; a steel shell which is arranged at an inside surface of the furnace; and a lining refractory which is arranged at an inside of the steel shell and includes a plurality of refractory blocks, wherein: each of the refractory blocks includes a hot-face end surface which has a hexagonal shape exposed to a middle of the furnace, and a cold-face end surface which has a hexagonal shape larger than the hot-face end surface, the cold-face end surface being arranged at an outer periphery side of the furnace; the refractory blocks are arranged such that each position of the hot-face end surface is positioned along the radial direction of the furnace at a predetermined reference position; and the refractory blocks are arrayed along the circumferential direction of an inside surface of the steel shell, thereby being stacked in a honeycomb manner.

The invention relates to a metal element (12) for anchoring an anti-erosion coating that is intended to be fastened alone in an isolated manner to a metal wall or assembled with other identical anchoring elements. The anchoring element (12) has an edge (12a) for fastening to said metal wall and an anchoring body firmly attached to the fastening edge (12a) and having an upper edge (12b) that is away from the fastening edge and intended to be covered by a composite material of concrete type. A section of this upper edge (12b), which is not intended to be juxtaposed and assembled with an upper edge of an identical anchoring element, is provided with a delimiting tab (16) in order to delimit a height of composite material that must cover the upper edge (12b) of said anchoring element, said delimiting tab (16) having a delimiting edge (18) that is a predetermined distance away from a plane defined by the upper edge (12b) of the anchoring element.