The ease of installation of castables has been one of the major reasons for the replacement of shaped materials by monolithics refractories. However, the extensive number of techniques available for the installation of monolithics has broadened in excess the classes of refractory castables in the market (i.e, vibratable, gunning, self-flow, shot-creting). Therefore, a significant demand for more versatile castable has emerged in the latest years. Expectations lay on the development of multifunctional castables that could be installed using most of the large variety of methods available. Nevertheless, it is still unknown if the versatility of multifunctional castables during installation would also result in benefits regarding the mixing step prior to application and the high temperature performance. The objective of this paper is to identify the main requisites necessary to obtain multifunctional castables and compare their rheological behavior and creep resistance at high temperature with that of castables installed with specific application techniques. Results indicate that the particle size distribution mainly determines the multifunctional feature of high-alumina ultra-low-cement castables.
castable; refractory; multifunctional; alumina; particle size distribution
