Abstract
As a fundamental study to develop a new process for treating iron-lead base alloys, “speiss”, with a considerably high content of arsenic or antimony, which are produced in smelting lead ores or secondary materials of lead under a strongly reductive condition, the phase relations and the minor elements distribution of copper, silver, gold and platinum in the Fe–Pb–As and Fe–Pb–Sb systems saturated with carbon were determined at 1473 K by a quenching method. It was found that a miscibility gap composed of an iron-rich alloy phase with a very small content of lead and a lead-rich alloy phase with very few contents of iron and carbon extended over the wide concentration range. Arsenic was mostly distributed in the iron-rich alloy phase, while antimony almost evenly in both phases. For the distribution of precious metals, it was found that silver was mostly enriched in the lead-rich alloy phase, platinum in the iron-rich alloy phase, while gold and copper almost evenly in both phases. Based on the obtained data of the phase separation and using thermodynamic data for the Pb–As and Pb–Sb binary systems, the activity coefficients of arsenic and antimony in the Fe–As and Fe–Sb systems saturated with carbon at 1473 K were derived and expressed by a formula with the interaction parameters.
