The Effects of Reactor Design on Partially Etched Titanium Carbide-Derived Carbon

Carbide-derived carbons are a class of amorphous carbon adsorbents with a narrow pore size distribution. Titanium carbide-derived carbon (TiC-CDC) with residual metal was synthesized by partial chlorination at 500°C. This partial metal removal in the carbide creates vacancies, about which the carbon reorganizes to form an amorphous, porous carbon structure. To understand the titanium removal process on a bulk scale, three reactor designs were tested: (1) a flow-over horizontal-bed reactor, (2) a vertical flow-through packed-bed reactor, and (3) a fluidized-bed reactor. These reactors were chosen to investigate how various Cl₂ flow patterns impact the etching uniformity on individual TiC-CDC particles. The horizontal- and packed-bed reactors non-uniformly etch TiC-CDC particles, while the fluidized-bed reactor produces samples with uniformly etched particles that follow the core-shell model of Ti extraction.