Measurement of protection factors of chemical cartridge, half-mask respirators under working conditions in a copper smelter.

The performance of three commonly used chemical cartridge respirators for SO2 was measured under working conditions in a copper smelter. An effective SO2 protection factor for each man-respirator trial was calculated as the ratio between average SO2 concentrations sampled outside the respirator mask and that simultaneously sampled from inside the mask. The in-use SO2 protection afforded by the three respirators proved to be highly variable with mean protection factors of 22, 18, and 13. The distributions of the protection factors and the effects of mask type, facial size, and mask comfort are discussed.