A Comprehensive Study of Pore Characteristics, Formation Mechanism and Reliability Analysis with Advanced Characterization Methods Within Pellets

In order to improve the accuracy of the porosity results of pellets, the reliability of three methods for measuring the pore structure was compared. The results show that there is a measurement error in the result of the traditional method, the mercury intrusion porosimetry (MIP) cannot detect closed pores, and the result of scanning electron microscope (SEM) method is more comprehensive. Additionally, three types of pore structures have been proposed to describe the pore formation mechanism of pellets, namely original pores, pores left by shrinkage of liquid phase and pores left by induration of mineral particles. Furthermore, the pore structures of pellets were analyzed by MIP and SEM. The results reveal that MIP can measure the pores with diameters less than 1 mu m, and the pore diameters measured by SEM range from 1.2 to 89.2 mu m. Finally, the curvature of the pores is measured to evaluate the consolidation degree of the pellet