Removing Hot Metal

Low tech, but, a powerful high velocity fan.

http://www.industrialfansdirect.com/IND-FA-HV.html

Greetings Guest...

My company can help you evaluate and design such a system if it is needed. That is what we do. However, there may be other options available. We need to discuss the project further...

Please respond to me via E-mail at:

The Technology Consortium, Ltd.

4TTC@charter.net

My website (www.4TTC.net) is currently undergoing renovations, otherwise I would send you there...

I think the simplest solution would to cool everything. A simple quenching with water system or cooling system will cool the material almost instantaneously.

An IR sensor and a vortex cooler should do the trick if it's not too big.

Do you have any suggestions for specific IR sensors? We need a sensor that can sense the hot material across a 40" belt width. I don't have any experience with these types of sensors and after googling IR Sensors I havn't come up with a company that makes a sensor for this type of application. I had a look at SMC and Festo's websites but didn't find anything there either. Thanks for your suggestion.

An IR sensor and a directed blast of CO-2, water, or a misting fan. How big a problem would it be to have water present along the conveyor?

Do you have any suggestions for specific IR sensors? We need a sensor that can sense the hot material across a 40" belt width. I don't have any experience with these types of sensors and after googling IR Sensors I havn't come up with a company that makes a sensor for this type of application. I had a look at SMC and Festo's websites but didn't find anything there either. Thanks for your suggestion.

How about a magnetic on a spinning drum that would lift the hot metal and then a stripper could knock off the metal and redirect that hot metal to a different container down a metal chute for holding until it cools down. That is what they use in the recycling crushers to move metal away from other materials from crushed parts.

They also use air to seperate out crushed plastic parts from metal blowing the plastic into containers of onto different conveyer belts.

Heck that might be a source of heat during the winter.

If it is getting that hot is it possible that your using more pressure than is necessay to pluverize those componets and creating your own problem here ?

We use a magnetic removal process already. Unfortunately the metal that is causing us problems is non magnetic. Mainly stainless steel but aluminum also. Thanks for the suggestion.

If the belt is flat, how about using a crown, so the belt is elevated in the center. That way molten metal will not sit for any length of time. It will flow down the crown and into a gutter where it will cool and solidify. Make sure you also deal with any fumes that will result from your operation.

AT 700 degrees, solder would be molten and liquid, at 700 degrees, steel and copper would not.

In a prior life we dumped red hot sinter onto a rubber belt that ran up hill about a 1/8 of a mile.where it then got screened. Patching belts meant a plant shut down for better part of a shift, so cooler mans job was important. We had down draft fans along the belt, and at the lower end we ran a lot of water (which meant plenty of fines for milo to shovel). we dripped water along the length of the belt and at the top, we had a gun for milo the cooler man to aim at the still red hot clinkers...

Contamination of the water with heavy metals makes the "water solution" a likely non starter for your electronics application.

Relocating the hot metal on the belt would reduce time it is in one spot. so a series of shorter belts would cut dwell time to 1/the number of shorter belts for the same length. An air blast on the return side would also help reduce the temperature of the belt surface prior to belt reload with hot materials, and the shorter dwell time on the belt would reduce the damage as well.

Engineering after the fact is seldom as elegant as proper engineering before...

BE careful with water - groundwater cleanups are very expen$ive; And if there is a lot of lead solders, air particulates may put your facility under surveillance.

milo

Hi ,

A lot of waste treatment plants use linear motors to separate no ferrous metals from other waste. Do a google and a whole host of stuff comes up. Basically if you have a fast moving magnetic field laterally across your belt it will drag the conductive material (not necessarily magnetic) with it in the same way that a 3ph motor drags the squirrel cage rotor around.

Good luck

Chas

I sure hate to see you go for the water and all the problems that come with that.

I wish a split belt system would work forming a "V" that would allow the hot metal to fall away without needing to be cooled with water.

Would dumping the pulvertized material into a spinning hooper (i forget the name) be helpful to allow for cooling. A spinning drum like a big cement mixer.

What about dampening the belt somewhere before the hot stuff is dropped on it.

Not wetting down the hot material but wetting the belt so that when the hot metal contacts the damp belt there is a heat loss that is adequate to save the belt for the duration of the trip.

Another possibility is to speed up the belt so the exposure time is limited to keep within a certain acceptable burn depth of the belt.

BAB

I do not know what kind of set up you have but if you install eccentric idlers on the belt, it may keep the material moving on the belt. This should stop the material from sitting in one spot and burning holes in the belt.