Sulphur condensing apparatus

Claim 1

Apparatus for condensing sulphur vapour and separating sulphur droplets from a sulphur-containing reaction gas from a Claus reactor, which apparatus comprises an elongated vessel; a nest of tubes which extend in the longitudinal direction of the vessel and are arranged in said vessel between two tube plates, through which tubes flows said sulphur-containing gas; pipe connection at the vessel housing for the supply and discharge of a coolant which flows around said nest of tubes; a gas flow inlet pipe connection and a gas flow outlet pipe connection at the vessel housing upstream and downstream of said nest of tubes, respectively; a separation unit, through said gas is forced, adapted to separate sulphur droplets from said gas and arranged in said vessel between the tube plates at the downstream ends of the tubes and said gas flow outlet pipe connection; the separation unit occupies a part of the vessel cross section perpendicular to the direction of the gas flow and the remaining part of the vessel cross section is closed off to gas flow by a gas-tight partition; a first discharge opening arranged at the bottom of said vessel upstream of said separation unit for discharging sulphur separated from said gas before said unit, and a second discharge opening at the bottom of said vessel downstream of said separation unit for discharging sulfur separated from said gas in and behind the separation unit; and the upstream and downstream discharge openings both open into a pipe connection which is divided by an extension of said partition and which is closed at the bottom, said closed pipe connection having a sulphur overflow opening downstream of said partition, the partition extension ending in spaced relationship above the bottom of said closed pipe connection, said sulphur overflow opening being arranged at such a height above the bottom edge of said partition extension that the hydrostatic pressure of the liquid sulphur which collects in said closed pipe connection, corresponding to said height, is at least equal to the maximum gas pressure drop across the separation unit.