Optimisation of one stage electrostatic precipitator for welding fume filtration

In addition to huge installations of electrostatic precipitators (esp), as those employed for dustfiltration in blast furnaces and cement factories, there are also small devices as the ones used for fumefiltration in welding shops. the aim of this paper is to optimize the geometric characteristics and theelectric operating conditions of a ``one-stage'' precipitator intended for the filtration of welding fumes.the experimental bench is composed of 2 units, each consisting in an horizontal wire (tungsten, diameter0.1 mm), energized from a high-voltage supply (c15 kv, 5 ma), and equally distant from two vertical plateelectrodes (aluminium, length 200 mm  variable width) connected to the ground. two ``one-factor-ata-time'' experiments paved the way for a composite experimental design that enabled the optimizationof esp geometry, i.e. the inter-electrode interval and width of the collecting electrodes.