At smelting plants, both copper and lead, it is found that near the blast furnaces the gases remain hot and dry, so that concrete, brick or stone, or steel, can safely be used. Lead-blast furnace gases will not injure such construction at a distance of 6 or 8 ft. away from the furnaces. For copper furnaces, roasters or pyritic smelting, concrete or lime mortar construction should be limited to within 200 or 300 ft. of the furnaces.
Another type of settling chamber is 20 ft. square in the clear, with concrete floor between beams and steel hopper bottom. This chamber is built within 150 ft. distance from the blast furnaces, and is one of the types used at the Shannon Copper Company’s plant at Clifton, Arizona. After passing the 200 ft. mark, there is no need of expensive hopper design. The amount of flue dust settled beyond this point is so small that it is a better investment to provide only small side doors through which the dust can be removed. The ideal arrangement is to have a system of condensing chambers, so separated by dampers that either set can be thrown out for a short time for cleaning purposes, and the whole system can be thrown in for best efficiency.
As to cross-section for condensing chambers, I consider that the following will come near to meeting the requirements. One, four, and six, concrete foundation; tile drainage; 9 in. brick walls, laid in adobe mortar, pointed on the outside with lime mortar; occasional strips of expanded metal flooring laid in joints; the necessary pilasters to take care of the size of cross-section adopted; the top covered with unpainted corrugated iron, over which is tamped a concrete roof, nearly flat; concrete to contain corrugated bars in accordance with light floor construction; and lastly, the corrugated iron to have two coats of graphite paint on under side.
The above type of roof is used under slightly different conditions over the immense dust chamber of the new Copper Queen smelter at Douglas, Arizona. The paint is an important consideration. Steel work imbedded in concrete should never be painted, but all steel exposed to fumes should be covered by graphite paint. Tests made by the United States Graphite Company show that for stack work the paint, when exposed to acid gases, under as high a temperature as 700 deg. F., will wear well.
CONCRETE IN METALLURGICAL CONSTRUCTION[45]
By Henry W. Edwards
The construction of concrete flues of the section shown in Fig. 31 gives better results than that shown in Fig. 30, being less liable to collapse. It costs somewhat more to build owing to the greater complication of the crib, which, in both cases, consists of an interior core only. For work 4 in. in thickness and under, I recommend the use of rock or slag crushed to pass through a 1.5 in. ring. Although concrete is not very refractory, it will easily withstand the heat of the gases from a set of ordinary lead-or copper-smelting blast furnaces, or from a battery of calcining or roasting furnaces. I have never noticed that it is attacked in any way by sulphur dioxide or other furnace gas.
Figs. 30 and 31.—Sections of Concrete Flues.