Smelters which source their anodes from specialist producers have a good economic reason to extend anode life, minimising the quantity of butt to be returned or otherwise disposed.

This is achieved by lowering the depleted anode as far into the pot as possible. A consequence of this can be ring erosion of the anode stubs.

The placement of carbon collars around anode stubs is a proven method of preventing ring erosion. VHE of Iceland has considerable expertise in the manufacture of automatic collar forming systems.

VHE‘s collar forming machine is fully automatic; it has a fast cycle time and may be easily installed in existing rodding plants. The machine uses card or aluminium, loaded as a coil and automatically fed, cut to length, then formed into a collar around the rod stub and securely closed.

The VHE collar filling machine measures and delivers carbon paste into the preformed collars. The design of the filling system ensures even paste distribution, providing a virtually dust-free operation to produce uniformly shaped and centered carbon collars.

VHE’s Collar Forming Machine and Collar Filling Machine together comprise an integrated Stub Protection System facilitating maximum anode life without unwanted anode stub erosion.