TOP-BLOWING OXYGEN LANCE FOR COPPER SMELTING AND CONVERTING

A laboratory scale, top blowing, injection lance for coppermaking has been developed and tested. This novel lance, based on heat pipe techno logy, is entirely non-consumable. Moreover, it can be operated without any cooling circuit whatsoever. Heat fluxes of about 0.9 MW/m(2) at t he lance tip are readily dissipated when the lance is used to inject p ure oxygen at rates exceeding typical, normalized industrial values. I n addition, a user-friendly software package, HEATPIPE, has been devel oped for simulating this new generation of injection lances. It has be en shown to be extremely useful in predicting heat pipe, injection lan ce behaviour. Copyright (C) 1996 Canadian Institute of Mining and Meta llurgy. Published by Elsevier Science Ltd