In the process of copper electrolysis production, the problem of impurity residue has always
been a technical barrier in the industry. If the copper particles, oxides and other metal
impurities attached to the surface of cathode plate are not handled properly, it will not
only affect the purity of copper material, but also lead to the increase of equipment loss
and production cost. The traditional process relies on manual scraping and chemical cleaning,
which is inefficient and risky, while the birth of fully automatic impurity cleaning system
provides a systematic solution to this problem through intelligent and modular design. In
this paper, we will analyze the operation process, technical advantages and industry value
of the system to provide practical reference for copper electrolysis enterprises.
The core pain point of copper electrolysis impurity treatment
The purity of electrolytic copper directly affects its application performance in power transmission,
precision electronics and other fields, but there are three major bottlenecks in the impurity cleaning process:
Uncontrollable residue: manual cleaning is difficult to completely remove micron-sized particles (e.g.,
copper powder with a particle size of <50μm), leading to fluctuations in the purity of copper cathode;
Risk of secondary pollution: chemical cleaning agents may penetrate into the electrolyte circulating
system, leading to imbalance in composition;
High labor costs: a single production line requires 6-8 operators working in shifts, and occupational
health hazards are prominent.
Take a medium-sized copper electrolysis plant as an example, the rework rate due to impurity residue
is as high as 5% per month under the traditional process, and the annual cost of loss exceeds 3 million
RMB. The introduction of fully automated impurity cleaning system is reconfiguring the production
process from the root.
Operating instructions for the fully automated cleaning system
The system adopts the four-stage intelligent control logic of “perception-decision-execution-feedback”, and
the operation process is divided into the following steps:
Step 1: Equipment initialization and parameter configuration
Cathode plate specification entry: Enter the parameters such as the size of the plate (length×width×thickness)
and the surface roughness threshold (recommended Ra≤1.2μm) through the control panel;
Impurity type selection: tick the main impurity types (such as copper particles, cuprous oxide, nickel slag, etc.)
according to the electrolyte composition, and the system automatically matches the cleaning mode;
Process route setting: select single machine independent operation or production line synergy mode linked
with electrolyzer and melting and casting line.
Step 2: Start the intelligent sensing module
High-precision scanning and positioning: the built-in LIDAR and spectrometer of the equipment are activated
to scan the cathode plate in three dimensions (accuracy of 0.01mm), identify the distribution of impurities and
adhesion strength, and generate the heat map of the cleaning path;
Real-time data upload: the scanning results are synchronized to the central control system, and the AI algorithm
automatically optimizes the cleaning sequence and strength parameters.
Step 3: Execute multimodal cleaning operation
Strong adhesion impurity treatment: start the ultrasonic high-frequency oscillator (frequency 20-40kHz),
stripping the deep embedded copper particles through cavitation effect;
Micro-particle adsorption: switch to negative pressure recovery module (vacuum ≤ -80kPa) to draw free
impurities into the closed pipe;
Surface polishing: use nano-scale soft brush head with inert gas injection to restore the polarity of the pole plate.
Step 4: Closed-loop recycling and quality re-inspection
Impurity sorting: the recovered material is separated from metal and non-metal components by eddy current
sorter, and the purity of copper powder reaches over 99.5%, which can be directly returned to furnace;
Online quality inspection: the cleaned cathode plate is detected by X fluorescence spectrometer, and the impurity
content exceeds the limit (e.g. >50ppm) automatically triggering the secondary cleaning.
Step 5: Operation and Maintenance and Fault Prediction
Intelligent maintenance reminder: The system prompts the replacement of brush heads, filters and other
wear parts according to the running hours and load rate;
Cloud diagnosis: vibration sensors and temperature probes monitor the status of the equipment in real time,
and abnormal data is automatically pushed to the operation and maintenance terminal.
Six core advantages of automatic cleaning system
Compared with the traditional process, the automatic system realizes all-round upgrading in the three
dimensions of efficiency, cost and quality:
Advantage 1: Impurity removal rate ≥99.9%
Through multi-sensor fusion and adaptive algorithms, the system can identify all impurities with particle
size >10μm, and the residual amount is stably controlled below 20ppm;
The purity of copper cathode is increased from 99.96% to 99.993%, which meets the aerospace-grade copper standard.
Advantage 2: 40% increase in comprehensive energy efficiency
A single machine handles 50-60 cathode plates (1.2m×1m specifications) per hour, which is 8-10 times more
efficient than manual operation;
Unit energy consumption is reduced by 35%, and power consumption per ton of electrolytic copper is reduced by 120kW-h.
Advantage 3: 70% reduction of labor cost
The operator of a single production line is reduced from 8 to 2 (only monitoring and emergency intervention are
required), saving more than 800,000 RMB in labor cost per year;
The occupational health risk of manual exposure to heavy metal dust is completely eliminated.
Advantage 4: Raw material recycling rate exceeds 95%
The closed-loop recycling system reduces the loss rate of copper powder from 12% to less than 2%, and the annual
value of recycled copper exceeds 1.5 million yuan (measured by annual production of 30,000 tons).
Advantage 5: Extend equipment life by 30%
Adaptive cleaning mechanism avoids excessive scraping, the loss rate of cathode plate is reduced from 0.8% to
0.1%, and the replacement cycle of the plate is extended to 2 years;
Self-lubricating design and predictive maintenance reduce the failure rate of core components, reducing average
annual maintenance costs by 45%.
Advantage 6: Environmental compliance upgrade
Full dry operation, no wastewater and exhaust gas emission, workshop dust concentration <1mg/m³
(national standard limit value 3mg/m³);
The utilization rate of copper powder recycling is upgraded to 98%, which helps the enterprise to
reach the goal of “double carbon”.
Application Scenarios and Adaptation Programs
For different production scales and process requirements, the automatic cleaning system can flexibly
adjust the configuration:
Large smelting bases: adopting multiple machines in parallel mode, adapting to high-speed production lines
with 200 cathode plates per hour;
Recycled copper refinery: enhanced sorting module to handle recycled copper materials containing iron,
zinc and other complex impurities;
Special copper workshop: customized ultra-precision cleaning head (compatible with 0.03mm ultra-thin pole
plate) to support the differentiated production of copper foil and copper strip.
Future direction of technology iteration
With the penetration of edge computing and digital twin technology, the next generation of automatic
cleaning system will be realized:
Process self-optimization: dynamically adjust the cleaning strategy according to electrolyte composition, current
density and other parameters;
Cross-process synergy: interoperability with electrolyzer and melting and casting furnace data to build a full-process
intelligent production chain;
Carbon footprint tracking: integrating carbon emission measurement module and automatically generating cleaner
production certification report.
Conclusion
The popularization of fully automated impurity cleaning system marks the new stage of copper electrolysis industry from
“experience-driven” to “data-driven”. It not only solves the technical problems that have plagued the enterprises for many
years, but also reshapes the competitiveness of the industry through the efficient utilization of resources and green
production. For the copper electrolysis enterprises that are in urgent need of transformation and upgrading, mastering