An Improved Method or Process for the Production of Refined Copper.
Year: 1891

page_text: Date of Application, 3rd July, 1891
Complete Specification Left, 2nd Sept., 1891-Accepted, 31st Oct., 1891
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION.
An Improved Method or Process for the Production of Refined
Copper.
I, CHRISTOPHER JAMES of Ida Villa, Swansea, in the County of Glamorgan
Metallurgist, do hereby declare the nature of this invention to be as follows:-
My invention relates to a method or process for the production of refined copper
from copper matte, regulus, or precipitate, of wide difference of richness, and has for
its object the reduction of the said matte direct to refined copper in a more simple
and economical manner than is at present known.
Whereas it is the practice at present to roast or sweat the copper matte broken
into suitable pieces in a furnace exposed to a current of air, to burn out the sulphur,
the copper with still a proportion of sulphur remaining is tapped out as "pimple
or "blister" copper.
29
A large portion of the copper passes into the roaster slags which have to be
remelted.
The pimple" or "blister" copper is then retreated for refining in a refinery
furnace with an oxidising atmosphere, skimmed, refined, and brought to the required
pitch for lading into cake.
In my improved method or process I carry on the first oxidising treatment upon
a regulus which may contain from 30% upwards of copper by calcination in a
suitable furnace until the matte has been converted into sulphate or nearly so the
matte having been first crushed suitably for calcination treatment..
The cost of labour and fuel for this partial calcination treatment is much less than
that required for the production of "blister" or "pimple" copper as above referred
I also save a considerable portion of the copper which in the blister" process
is lost for the time in the roaster slags and entirely avoid the expensive treatment
to.
in the roaster furnace.
I now treat the calcined sulphates direct in the refinery furnace, where refined.
copper is produced by the process as practised for copper refining at present.
In my method of refining the sulphates which under the action of heat breaks up
naturally into metallic copper and sulphur gas.
I find that all volatile impurities such as arsenic, antimony, bismuth, etc. are more
freely got rid of than in the roaster process, owing to the evolution of the large
volumes of sulphur gas given off during melting in this refining process.
Dated this 3rd day of July 1891
FELL & WILDING,
1, Queen Victoria Street, London, E.C., Agents for the Applicant.
COMPLETE SPECIFICATION.
An Improved Method or Process for the Production of Refined
Copper.
I, CHRISTOPHER JAMES of Ida Villa, Swansea, in the County of Glamorgan
Metallurgist, do hereby declare the nature of my invention and in what manner the
same is to be performed to be particularly described and ascertained in and by the
following statement :-
This invention relates to an improved method of producing refined copper from
copper matte regulus, precipitate and ore, and the operations entailed therein are
conducted as described herein.
In the ordinary methods now in use copper ores are concentrated into a matte or

page_text: regulus of about 75% of copper, this matte consisting principally of copper and
sulphur is piled in a large pieces as practicable in a roaster furnace and slowly
sweated down whilst exposed to a current of air let in through the side doors of the
furnace and through air holes provided for this purpose and through passages
arranged through the fire by the workman thus burning off in successive stages
nearly all the sulphur and leaving the copper after melting and skimming to be
tapped out as pimple or blister copper, this operation seldom takes less than
24 hours for the production of 3 tons of pimple or blister copper from matte of 75
or.76% of copper, whilst a large amount of copper passes into the roaster slags
which have to be resmelted for the recovery of the copper, the pimple or blister
copper thus made is then filled as pigs, into a refinery furnace, and again sweated
down under an oxidising flame, skimined, refined, and brought to the required pitch
for lading into cake ingots anodes &c.
In the new method proposed herein I avoid the expensive and wasteful operation
of roasting in a roaster furnace by substituting a cheap calcination of the matte, and
so arranging the calcination that 1 retain in the calcined charge sufficient sulphur
(either as undecomposed sulphur or a sulphate formed during the calcination) to
reduce all the oxide of copper formed and at the same time to evolve both the
oxygen and sulphur as sulphurous anhydride (SO2) upon melting this imperfectly
calcined matte in a refinery furnace.
This proper pitch of calcination is easily and properly found in practice.
The matte is crushed through. sieve or smaller if convenient, and calcined in a
ordinary reverberatory furnace or revolving calciner or any calciner or kilu at
present in ordinary use or that may be designed or constructed by the above named
inventor or others.
The calcination of the matte is so conducted to such a state of desulphurising or
sulphating as is found most economical to render (upon melting the matte so
calcined in a refinery furnace) all the copper in the charge to metallic copper of a
pitch similar to the blister copper from the ordinary roaster process.
Copper matte of from 75 to 76 % of copper contains little else than copper and
sulphur when this matte is perfectly calcined it is converted to copper oxide this
copper oxide when melted with copper sulphide will yield the copper from both the
portions of copper compounds with the evolution of the sulphur and oxygen as
sulphurous anhydrith.
My aim is by careful calcination (and this is perfectly practicable) to in the
calciner charge just that quantity of sulphur which will ensure this evolution of the
sulphur and oxygen in secondary treatment in a neutral furnace.
The imperfectly calcined matte when it is drawn from the calciner, or upon
completion of calcination is taken direct to a refinery furnace and at once melted,
when the resulting copper is at once without remelting or other expense skimmed,
refined and laded into cakes ingots anodes &c., or I may when using a matte poor in
copper (or richer if convenient) mix my calcined charge with clay or other plastic
material or flux necessary for making it into bricks or lumps and melt in a cupola
furnace (water jacket blast furnace) running the resulting copper at once into bars,
ingots, anodes &c. or into a refinery furnace to be there refined brought to pitch and
laded into cake, ingots, anodes &c.
I claim that by so calcining copper matte and then melting the calcined matte in
a refinery for the immediate production of refined copper instead of by the usual
wasteful & expensive operations of roasting and melting first in a roaster furnace
and again in a refinery furnace with a heavy production of rich slag in each
operation that 'more copper is at once obtained in a saleable form at less than a
third of the usual cost, that the expense of reworking the roaster slag is dispensed
with and that the locking up of large amounts of capital in roaster furnaces and
bottoms is entirely avoided.
This process is especially beneficial to the treatment of poor refractory precipitates,
these precipitates according to their percentage of copper is mixed with a cor-
responding proportion of raw matte (uncalcined) this mixture is calcined and

page_text: brought to the proper condition (the sulphur of the matte combining with the
precipitate) so as to leave sufficient sulphur in the calcined charge to react and
combine with the oxygen producing upon subsequent melting metallic copper and
sulphurous anhydride, the reaction of the sulphur and oxygen in the charge when
melted in the refinery furnace will eliminate nearly all the impurities usually found
in poor precipitates.
In my method of working I find that all volatile impurities (arsenic antimony,
bismuth, &c.) are much more freely got rid of than in the usual roasting process,
partly in the calcination and afterwards during the evolution of the larger volumes
of sulphur gas given off on melting in the refinery furnace, aided by the intense
chemical heat developed by the reaction, set up by the combining of the melted
oxides and sulphides (or sulphate) in my prepared charge.
The non volatile impurities are got rid of to at least as great an extent as by the
roasting process by a judicious adjusting of the calcination so that oxide of copper
shall predominate in the charge and so give a slag of melted oxide in the refinery
furnace, with or without fluxes added, when much or many impurities render such
an addition needful; such non volatile impurities are naturally collected in this slag
and are skimined off with it.
Although my process works best and cleanest with copper matte of about 75
to 78% of copper I treat matte of from 30 to 80% of copper with correspondingly
good results over the roaster process.
Having now particularly described and ascertained the nature of this inven-
tion and in what manner the same is to be performed I declare that what I
claim is :-
A process for the production of refined copper from copper matte, regulus,
precipitate or sulphide ores, consisting in the first partial calcination of the matte
or ore and in ceasing the first calcining operation so that sufficient sulphur (either
as undecomposed sulphur or sulphate) may remain, so that on a second heating in a
neutral atmosphere all the oxides of copper formed by calcination shall be reduced
by the remaining sulphur present (which are in intimate chemical contact with one
another) to produce refined copper from both oxides and sulphides and sulphates
present by the combination of the sulphur and oxygen to form SO,.
Dated this 2nd day of September 1891.
FELL & WILDING,
1, Queen Victoria Street, London, E.C., Agents for the Applicant.