Abstract
The Peirce-Smith Converter (PSC) of the primary smelters of Aurubis is an essential asset for the production of pure copper from copper concentrate. Tuyere length measurements using a steel hook is a common manual work in many copper smelters around the world. Aurubis is continuously searching for new ways to improve productivity and operational health and safety (OHS). Therefore, the use of a new sensor should lead to objective measurements and to a higher amount of available information. Operators should be kept away from potentially dangerous zones by removing the manual measurement. In addition, measurement time should be lowered to have the possibility to improve productivity.
This paper describes the procedure of the new sensor development, testing of different technologies, construction of a prototype and testing under lab- and industrial-scale to measure automatically the remaining tuyere length and refractory thickness in the tuyere zone of a Peirce-Smith converter. The first results of the measurements are presented and discussed.