| Abstract: | A pyrometallurgical method for partial separation of hafnium from zirconium has been investigated. The method involves continuous reaction between a flowing gas mixture of zirconium tetrachloride and hafnium tetrachloride with solid sodium chloride in a packed bed reactor. The solid-vapour reaction enriches the vapour phase with respect to zirconium tetrachloride. This may be attributed to a more favourable reaction for hafnium tetrachloride. The influence of a number of parameters, e.g. temperature, gas flow rate, particle size and bed length, has been studied. Decreases in flow rate and particle size and increase in bed length are found to favour separation, while temperature has little effect. A simple equation has been derived to explain the experimental observations. |
