In the Hall-Héroult process, prebaked carbon anodes are utilized to produce primary aluminium. The quality of the anode plays a crucial role in the efficiency of electrowinning primary aluminium. In the production of anodes, the anode baking is considered as the stage most frequently causing anode problems. During the baking process, the anode undergoes complex physicochemical transformations. Moreover, the anode at a lower position, imposed by loading pressures from upper anodes, will creep during this process. Thus, the production of high-quality anodes demands efficient control of their baking process. This paper aims to investigate the thermo-chemo-mechanical properties of the anode paste mixture at high temperatures. These properties include kinetic parameters of pitch pyrolysis such as the activation energy and the pre-exponential factor, the thermal expansion coefficient (TEC) and relevant mechanical parameters related to the elastic, the viscoelastic and the viscoplastic behaviours of the anode. For this purpose, experiments consisting of the thermogravimetric analysis, the dilatometry and the creep test were carried out. Based on the obtained results, the forementioned parameters were identified. Relevant mechanical parameters were expressed as a function of a new variable, called the shrinking index, which is related to the volatile released in open and closed pores of the anode. This variable would be used to highlight the chemo-mechanical coupling effect of the anode mixture. New insights into the phenomena such as the expansion due to the increase of the pore pressure and the chemical shrinkage of the anode during the baking process were also gained in this work. These investigations pave the way for modeling the thermo-chemo-poromechanical behaviour of the anode during the baking process.
Keywords: Hall–Héroult process; creep test; dilatometry; prebaked anode; shrinking index; thermogravimetric analysis.