The Theory of Stratification and Its Application In Ore-Dressing

WHILE Mr. Fahrenwald has been working on the fundamentals of ore-dressing, in Idaho, the Northwest Experiment Station of the U. S. Bureau of Mines, in cooperation with the University of Washington, has been studying the corresponding fundamentals for the closely-allied subject of coal-washing. In this work many of the principles outlined in Mr. Fahrenwald's paper have been touched on, one important exception being that phase of his studies where conditions were approximated between those existing on a table and those existing in a hindered-settling classifier. During the past three years this work has been given over almost exclusively to a study of coal-tabling to devise better methods of cleaning fine sizes of coal, particularly the coals of the Northwest, which are very difficult to wash. One important result of this study thus far has been the development of a satisfactory hindered-settling coal classifier, now in use in several commercial plants. Recently table stratifica-tion has been the subject for study. This latter phase of the work with coal,. as well as the earlier portion dealing with hindered-settling classification, has in a measure paralleled Mr. Fahrenwald's work with ore. Without going into details about the results of the coal experiments, I shall merely say that, from a quali-tative standpoint, they are, in general, concordant with Mr. Fahrenwald's, but that from a quantitative stand-point the results, particularly those with, table strati-fication, are somewhat different. These differences may disappear as the work progresses-Mr. Fahrenwald is further ahead with his experiments than we are at the Northwest Station-but if not, the disparity would not be surprising, and indeed would be what one might reasonably expect when investigators work on two very dissimilar materials and use different apparatus and methods of study. However, this- mention of our coal-washing experiments is made only in passing. A principle of general application that may be estab-lished from Mr. Fahrenwald's paper is that different types of stratification should be used in successive' gravity-concentration processes to. obtain best results.