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By Gülay Bulut, Mustafa Özer, Yunus Emre Benkli, Olgaç Kangal, Istanbul Technical University, Mustafa Tarkan

"Zeolites are naturally occurring as hydrated aluminosilicate minerals. They belong to the class of minerals known as “tectosilicates” and are related to the common minerals feldspar and quartz. Seven natural zeolites that occur in large, commercially exploitable deposits, are: clinoptilolite, chabazite, mordenite, phillipsite, erionite, analcite, and ferrierite. Among them, clinoptilolite is the most abundant one and is not the best known, but is one of the more useful natural zeolite. Clinoptilolite [(Na3K3) (Al6Si30O72) 24 H2O] is very closely related to heulandite and is currently being considered for disuse it self as it may just be a variety of heulandite. It differs from heulandite significantly only in its enrichment in potassium and slightly more silica and it is argued that a separate mineral is not needed.There are large zeolite deposits in western part of Turkey. The sample used in this study was taken from the Gördes region of these deposits. Screen, chemical, XRD and mineralogical analyses were used to determine properties of the natural zeolite sample used in this work.According to the size distribution of the sample, it is found that the zeolite sample used in this study is below 1 mm in size and almost 80% of it is below 0.5 mm. X-Ray Diffraction (XRD) and mineralogical analyses show that the natural zeolite is found to be in the forms of clinoptilolite and heulandite. Clinoptilolite forms as a devitrification product of volcanic glass in tuffs. Quartz, clay minerals, orthoclase, plagioclase, biotite, seruzite-muskovite and epidote were observed as impurities. XRD analysis also shows that the sample contains approximately 58-60% clinoptilolite, 5% quartz, 5% feldspar, 10% smectite, 5- 10% illite and mica and remaining volcanic tuffs. Several types of mineral processing methods were performed in order to remove impurities from the natural zeolite sample to produce high purity zeolite. Gravity separation methods such as shaking table and superpanner were carried out for separating heavy minerals, while high intensity dry magnetic separation was used for discarding magnetic minerals."

Jan 1, 2003

By A. Güney, G. Önal

"The tailings of the Bigadiç Colemanite Concentrator at the West of Turkey which contain 18 % B2O3 and 1.57 % SO3 are collected at the tailing dams near the Concentrator. In this research, it was aimed to obtain colemanite concentrates with a minimum content of 40 % B2O3 and a maximum 0.5 % SO3 from the tailings. At the experimental studies, decrepitation methods were systematically applied following attrition scrubbing and sizing. At the end of the tests, the best decrepitation result were described, at 500oC temperature for 15 min. duration, the final concentrate having 57.84 % B2O3, 0.44 % SO3 with 73 % recovery was obtained.Boron ores reserves of Turkey are about 2.5 billion tons and Turkey has the 63% share of the World’s boron reserves. The boron reserves are located at Eskisehir (Kirka), Kutahya (Emet), Balikesir (Bigadic) and Bursa (Kestelek) districts in Western Turkey. In 2002, the total amount of boron production of Turkey was about 1.4 million tons, which is 40 % of the World boron production.Bigadiç colemanite (Ca2B6O11. 5 H2O) ore with a content of 30-31 %B2O3 are concentrated by attrition tumbling and classification process. So the final concentrates with contents of 40 and 42 % B2O3 are obtained at the size fractions of –125+25mm and –25+ 3 mm respectively. The tailings materials with an 18 % B2O3 content are collected at the tailing dams near the Concentrator. In this research, it was aimed to obtain colemanite concentrates with a minimum content of 40 % B2O3 and a maximum 0.5 % SO3 from Bigadic tailings having 18 % B2O3 and 1.57 % SO3.In experimental tests, attrition scrubbing, wet sieving, gravity separation, electrostatic separation, flotation and decrepitation were adopted to the colemanite tailings, and optimum beneficiation conditions were obtained."

Jan 1, 2003

By P. Khattri

At Tata Steel, Coal is washed in gravity and froth flotation circuit at 13-15 mm size and below. Being coal is high in ash (~35%) and difficult washability characteristics (having high (~40 %) NGM at desired ash levels) needs more and timely quality data of ROM for effective optimization and process control. Conventional approach of supplying quality data takes 4-5 hours time. This means during this period, it is assumed that coal is having similar characteristics as of previous set and it is not possible to fine tune during this time which resulted in yield loss. Hence producing clean coal on agreed ash value consistently is a challenging task because of high NGM and variation in input quality. To overcome the problem of collection of representative sample and timely result a new technology was adopted Prompt Gamma Neutron Activation Analysis (PGNAA) technology which is basically an online analyser using Gamma rays as the source to measure the ash content in coal running on a conveyor which gives real time ash analysis. The details of this technological intervention are discussed in details in this paper. Keywords: near gravity material, PGNAA

Sep 1, 2012

By Ming’an Wei, Chuanyao Sun, Zhenguo Song, Zengwen Dou, Yangge Zhu

"The effects of pH value and dissolved oxygen(DO) in the pulp to the Eh and flotation recovery of pyrite were investigated using potential online detection system. The effects of DO on the Eh and flotation recovery were tested which DO changed from 0.5mg/L to 19.5mg/L in six different pH buffer flotation systems (pH: 4.00, 5.62, 6.86, 9.18, 10.01 and 10.96 respectively). Results of potential detected online demonstrated that the pyrite electrode has nearly the same response to potential as with platinum electrode for the FeS2-xanthate-H2O flotation system under the study conditions. Pulp potential and recovery of pyrite were remarkably influenced by pH, both of them decreased with the increasing of pH and, especially, sharp decreased after pH above 9. As the concentration of DO was increased, the Eh was also increased in all the six different buffer solution, while the flotation recovery was decreased. And the amplitude of variation for Eh was not obvious in acidic and neutral solutions, but on the contrary, the change for flotation recovery was remarkable in neutral and alkaline conditions. This may indicate that the flotation of pyrite will be deteriorated in alkaline and high DO concentration conditions."

Jan 1, 2014

Compressive crushing is applied in crushing plants used in mineral, mining, and aggregate in-dustry for fragmentation of rock materials. From a global perspective, the total volume of crushed rock is massive and corresponds to several billion tons. All societies have to fulfil a daily need of rock material products and its derivatives such as metals and minerals. The business for metals and minerals is global while the aggregates production is mainly a local industry. This paper presents a broader overview of optimisation with respect to product yield, use of natural resources and energy consumption. High level plant optimisation of compressive crushing plants is covered as well as real-time optimisation and optimisation of single production units. Each of three optimisation areas are presented and a discussion around how these three areas will be able to communicate with each other is given. Several models, e.g. process performance behav-iour with respect to wear, as well as fitness functions can be common for all three areas. Well-defined and representative fitness functions are of the utmost importance in order to assure that the optimisation results reflect the production targets. It is concluded that great benefits can be achieved by linking together different areas of optimisa-tion. The future for compressing crushing lies, without a doubt, in tailored processes both with re-spect to machines optimised for each customer, plant parameters and operation routines as well as an on-line adjustment, which takes into account current information and control possibilities.

Jan 1, 2014

By N. S. Phala

Declining gold grades, mineralogical complexity of ore bodies, increasing input costs, more stringent conditions in the licenses to operate, and uncertain gold price dynamics combine to exert significant ongoing pressure on margins of gold producers. Innovative approaches of extracting the metal from its ores are required to realize value from existing and future assets. In a conventional gold processing plant, size reduction of mined ore to produce floatable or leachable product is a significant cost contributor. A step change in cost reduction will be attained if radically energy efficient grinding approaches can be developed, replacing tumbling mills. In the path towards that goal, some quick wins are possible through waste rejection before grinding, and pre-treatment of mill feed to reduce grinding energy demands. Gold locked in complex mineralizations puts pressure on margins by increasing cost per oz (typically high $/t and low metal recoveries) in the hydrometallurgical steps. Gold miners are primarily price takers. The current narrow range of gold uses (predominantly investment and jewellery) is not an entirely desirable state. Some diversification into commercial uses would potentially be a price stabilizer. In this paper, promising research directions, some not always fully explored in the gold metallurgy research space, are highlighted to stimulate radical innovation for substantial value enhancements. The author strongly believes a shift from a traditionally conservative and incremental innovation approach to a more aggressive one, across all aspects of the gold metallurgy value stream (processes to products), is what the industry needs. Keywords: gold metallurgy value stream, thiobaccilus ferroxidants, HPGR

Sep 1, 2012

By J. Kolacz

A new optical sorting system based on a complex image analysis and high definition imaging has been developed by Comex. The image analysis is based on high definition cameras of different types and advanced filtration tools for verification of waste particles. Different mineral properties are used to identify the processed material. The system is further combined with a high speed rejection mechanism based on FPGA technology and operating in real time conditions. This provides a minimal error when removing waste particles from the sorted material.

Jan 1, 2014

By A. D. Bas

Copper minerals present difficulties during the cyanide leaching of gold ores leading to excessively high consumption of cyanide (and oxygen) coupled with low extraction of gold. Copper cyanide species, if present at high levels, adversely affects the downstream processes such as the activated carbon adsorption and the effluent treatment. In this study, the extraction of gold from a copper-bearing gold ore by ammoniacal cyanide leaching was studied. Furthermore, ammonia leaching as a pretreatment process ahead of cyanide leaching was also examined. Only ~12% of gold was extracted by direct cyanide leaching of the ore. The addition of lead nitrate did not affect the leaching of gold. When ammoniacal cyanide leaching system was used, the extraction of gold was significantly improved to >90%. Similarly, the pretreatment of the ore by ammonia leaching was shown to lead to high gold extractions (98%), in subsequent cyanide leaching with significant reductions in the consumption of cyanide. This appeared to be linked with the ready dissolution/removal of copper during ammonia leaching.

Sep 1, 2012

By L. Filippov

"Nickel is an important metal with the total global consumption of about 2 million tons per year. It is sourced from both sulfide and laterite ore, but currently laterites are becoming more attractive for nickel production due to the depletion of high grade nickel sulfide ores. Laterites are generally processed by hydro or pyro-metallurgy and therefore, pre-concentration of nickel before such processes is very important. In this paper the effect different physical methods (including flotation) on the pre-concentration of nickel in laterite ores will be discussed. The ore used in this study was a laterite from South East Asia. Nickel was upgraded using different methods such as magnetic separation, flotation and sizing. The effect of ore mineralogy on choosing the best strategy to upgrade nickel will be discussed. The findings of this project will help to unlock a substantial volume of nickel with significant value from laterite ores.INTRODUCTION Nickel is an important metal with the total global consumption of about million tons per year which has grown rapidly during last decades (Mackey, 2011). Nickel is sourced from two different types of ores, sulfide and laterite. The majority (about 70%) of the world’s nickel resources occur as laterite ores which are often complex, and low grade, and therefore expensive to treat using conventional methods (Xu et al., 2013). Today, nickel laterites are more attractive for production of nickel as the amount of high grade nickel sulfide ores has diminished (Janwong, 2012). Therefore more economic processes to recover nickel from these resources should be developed.It should be noted that nickel laterite mineralogy is complex, and nickel often presents as ultrafine inclusions in a number of mineral phases. Because of the low nickel concentration and variable distribution in these phases, effective upgrading by physical separation processes would be challenging. Researchers have tried to improve nickel laterite flotation recovery by using a number of feed preparation techniques. A summary of the nickel grades obtained using flotation and magnetic separation as reported in the literature is presented in Table 1. It can be seen that only minor nickel upgrades have been reported. Quast et al. (2015) have concluded that the complex mineralogy of nickel laterite ores makes it difficult to achieve any significant nickel upgrading by physical techniques, including flotation. They achieved 40% increase in the nickel content (from 1.0% to 1.4%) at a nickel recovery of 43% (Quast et al., 2015). Various attempts in USA, New Caledonia, India and Australia, to upgrade nickel in laterite using magnetic separation have not been successful (Quast et al., 2015). A recent comprehensive review on topics influencing nickel laterite flotation has shown that further investigations in the flotation of laterite ores are undoubtedly warranted (Farrokhpay & Filippov, 2016)."

Jan 1, 2018

By L. Z. Li

The application of some environment-friendly mineral processing technology was introduced in Xitieshan lead?zinc mine and Hugary copper mine of China Western Mining Co., Ltd, located in western plateau area where the ecological environment is extremely fragile. The results of the significant economic efficiency were obtained by applying these new techniques while the protection of peripheral environment and the improvement of ecology were made.

Jan 1, 2014

By Q. Shi

An investigation into the hydrophobic aggregation of ultrafine smithsonite in surfactant solution has been undertaken through a combination of hydrophobic flocculation experiments, zeta potential measurements, surface tension measurements, and contact angle measurements. The experimental results have revealed that the behaviors of hydrophobic aggregation were closely correlated with the particle hydrophobicity, but they were not lowered byte change of the particle surface charges due to surfactants adsorption. On the other hand, the liquid (solution) surface tension (?LV) plays an important role in hydrophobic aggregation, and the hydrophobic aggregation could not occur below the critical liquid (solution) surface tension (?c). Meanwhile, this flocculation has been observed to require sufficient stirring strength and magnitudes of kinetic energy input to achieve the maximum aggregation degree. From the microflotation results, it has been found that the flotation kinetics response of smithsonite fines is markedly improved due to sufficient stirring strength, and the stirring strength influenced the floc flotation in a manner quite similar to their influence on the hydrophobic aggregation, suggesting that the formation of hydrophobic flocs is a promising means to recover smithsonite in the fine size range.

Sep 1, 2012

By H. J. Cao

Valuable elements could be extracted by microorganism ferment fluid from bauxite, which mainly due to bacteria acid namely organic acid. And after leaching, reclaiming the remainder organic acid in leaching solution was an important procedure for bauxite leaching process. the re-searching status about organic acid reclaiming process from bauxite ore bioleaching solution was summarized. Common processes for recycling organic acid from bauxite bioleaching solution in this period and their advantages and disadvantages, research aspects which need being confirmed for the future were Indicated

Jan 1, 2014

By B. Das

Waste water produced from coal preparation plants posses several problems during dewatering and solid/liquid separation. The natural sedimentation rate of the particles present in colloidal and finely divided suspended form is very slow. Flocculation technology is being applied in most of the coal washeries to recover water which is being accomplished through the use of inorganic salts, polymeric flocculants or both depending on the chemical and physical characteristics of the pollutants present in the waste water. The waste tailing water from Piperware coal preparation plant, Central Coalfield Limited (CCL), India, is highly turbid containing ~ 16000 NTU with negative surface charge in the pH range of 2 to 10. Polymeric flocculants in conjunction with fine magnetite is investigated to achieve faster settling rate with lowest level of water turbidity. The conditions affecting the interaction between the reagents and the turbid particles present in the tailings water are investigated. It is possible to bring down the turbidity of the water to < 90 NTU from very high turbid tailing water by using 2 mg/L of the polymeric flocculent in combination with 0.1 g/L of magnetite at natural pH of the tailing slurry. It has been found that finely divided positively charged magnetite particles in combination with the flocculent selectively coat the negatively charged impurities present in water and thereby increase the settling rate under the influence of a magnetic field.

Jan 1, 2014

By N. Vasumathi

Most of the Iron ore washing plants set up in India in the earlier days consist of sizing of the ore by dry / wet screening, washing and classification by screw classifiers. In this classical approach, iron values were lost in the form of fines and ultrafine into the tailing ponds as they had little commercial value in those days and accumulated in huge quantities over the years. As the high grade deposits are getting exhausted and the demand for high grade finer material for pellet making is ever increasing, focus is shifting towards recovering the values from the erstwhile tailing ponds by column flotation. This is also supposed to mitigate to a certain extent the environmental problems caused by the ever expanding and unmanageable tailing dams. A case study is presented wherein a composite sample is prepared from samples drawn systematically from multi - locations in a sprawling tailing dam. Laboratory scale column flotation tests on this composite tailings sample, basically originating from two operating iron ore beneficiation plants of JSW Steel Ltd., one of the leading producers of steel in India are found to be encouraging. Desliming followed by reverse and cationic flotation tests using flotation column resulted in the concentrate of 61.88% Fe, 4.81% SiO2, 2.52% Al2O3 and 3.30% loss on ignition (LOI) from the tailings analyzing 57.86% Fe, 7.10% SiO2, 3.52% Al2O3 and 6.14% LOI with 52% weight recovery. The causes for the quality improvement could be attributed to desliming of un-liberated ultra fines of kaoline and hydrated iron oxides and their further reduction by efficient flotation process. The process and the cationic collector developed for this purpose are adopted in the new flotation plant created to treat these tailings. Keywords: iron ore, washing, ultra fines, tailings pond, column flotation

Sep 1, 2012

By M. Lundström, J. Aromaa, S. Seisko

"Gold dissolution was investigated in ferric chloride media, promoted as one of the most promising alternatives for cyanide-free gold leaching. The characteristics of gold open circuit potential (OCP) and its relation to gold dissolution rate was investigated. Furthermore, the reaction mechanism of gold dissolution in ferric chloride leaching was discussed. The effect of solution variables, [Fe3+] = 0.02–1.0 M, [Cl–] = 2–5 M, T = 25–95 °C and pH = 0–1.0, on OCP and dissolution rate were studied electrochemically using rotating disk electrode (RDE) and linear polarization resistance (LPR) method with ?cyc = 1000 RPM. The investigated gold OCPs in ferric chloride solutions were found to vary between 597 and 688 mV vs. saturated calomel electrode (SCE) and gold dissolution rates between 1.2·10–5–5.0·10–4 mol s–1 m–2. Increase in temperature (25–55 °C) and ferric concentration (0.02–1.0 M) changed OCP into more positive values, while increase in chloride concentration (2–5 M) decreased it. The logarithm of gold dissolution rate was shown to increase linearly with increasing OCP at the temperature range 25–95 °C, ferric concentration range 0.02–0.5 M and chloride concentration range 2–4 M. A notable increase in the gold dissolution reaction rate was evident at T > 55 °C. INTRODUCTION Currently cyanide leaching is the predominant method used in gold production from primary raw materials (Marsden and House, 2006). However, since the Baia Mare disaster in Romania in 2000, the use of cyanide has been the subject of international concern due to the toxic nature of the chemical posing a significant health threat if exposed to the ecological entities (Hilson and Monhenius, 2006; UNEP/OCHA, 2000). Therefore, several countries e.g., Costa Rica, Czech Republic, Germany, Hungary, Turkey, many states of the USA and provinces of Argentina, have started to ban or limit cyanidation via legislation (Laitos, 2012). Thus, alternative solutions, such as thiourea, thiosulphate, oil-coal agglomerates as well as halides have been investigated in order to replace cyanide as lixiviant (Adams, 2016; Aromaa et al., 2014; Aylmore, 2005; Hilson and Monhemius, 2006; Lampinen et al., 2015). Ferric and cupric chloride leaching have been reported to have advantage over cyanidation being capable to dissolve refractory gold minerals, without pre-treatment such as pressure oxidation or roasting (Angelidis et al., 1993; Lundström et al., 2014; Marsden and House, 2006; van Meersbergen et al., 1993). According to Aylmore (2005), 4% of publications for alternative lixiviants to cyanide in gold leaching were within category oxidative chloride processes including aqua regia and acid ferric chloride leaching. Further, some patents have been granted for ferric chloride leaching of gold (Abe and Hosaka, 2010; Lundström et al., 2016)"

Jan 1, 2018

By M. Marinov

The Bulgarian deposits of quartz-kaolin raw materials are localized in the NE Bulgaria. For many years, the quartz-kaolin sand separation has been performing by water washing technology. After wet separation the raw material yields two products ? washed kaolin (different grades) and quartz sand (different grades). Research and development program has started to improve the quartz-kaolin sand separation. The program has undertaken an increasing of processing capacity, to decrease the losses in the tailings and to provide production of new quartz sand grades. The kaolin-silica raw materials from Vetovo open mine and the technological tailings from Vetovo processing plant were characterized. It was established that there are a lot of losses of quartz in final tailings. New approach on kaolin-silica raw material separation was tested in laboratory scale. The test work was performed on Derrick Stacksizer screening machines. The results of laboratory experiment show that there are possibilities to increase the quartz sand recovery and to start the production new grade sand. The full-scale pilot test was performed including the following units: two Derrick Stacksizer screening machines equipped with 0.430 mm and 0.150 mm opening Derrick Urethane Panel, respectively; Flat bottom DN 500 Hydrocyclone and DN 100 Hydrocyclon. The pilot test data clearly demonstrate that the Derrick Stacksizer screening machines are suitable for Bulgarian silica-kaolin raw material. Based on the test data a new quartz-kaolin separation technology was developed. The new technology was introduced in Vetovo processing plant increasing processing capacity and decreasing the losses of quartz in final tailings. Additionally the production of silica sand grade PK 0.16 is increased and starts the production a new grade PK 0.10.

Sep 1, 2012

By B. Gorain, O. A. Bascur

"The advent of digital revolution has now enabled us with numerous tools that could be leveraged to transform our operational data into actionable insights. Key opportunities with digitization include better visualization, transparency, integrated planning and execution for value-chain optimization, that results in smarter production, intelligent response to changes in ore, process and equipment conditions, reduce energy and waste along with prevention of asset breakdown, safety and environmental issues. It is important to realize that these digital tools have limited value, from a metallurgical operational context, if we cannot bring-in the appropriate domain expertise along with getting the basics right. The focus within Barrick is to ensure that there is adequate depth of different disciplines built into our platforms along with breadth to integrate other disciplines such as geology and mining for an effective Mine-to-Mill integration. A gold recovery improvement strategy based on optimal Gaudin size distribution, leaching performance monitoring and guidance via feed grade maps is discussed. Simultaneous identification of process and equipment constraints enable finding the best overall conditions for Gold recovery. This paper discusses the methodology, findings, and challenges in the ongoing journey of implementing a Metallurgy Analytics platform that evolves from being retrospectively descriptive to anticipatively prescriptive.INTRODUCTION The last few decades have seen some remarkable advancement in information technology, but recently various digital technologies have resulted in several synergies to deliver innovation in diverse applications. The mining industry has been relatively slow in adopting these technologies compared to the other industries, but this scenario is changing fast. Mining companies globally are going through a series of challenges such as declining ore grades with complex metallurgy, increasing depth of ore bodies, high capital and operating costs, lower productivity, shortage of technical resources, significant pressure from stakeholders to deliver, along with growing environmental and corporate social responsibility issues. Improvement in profitability would need significant improvements in operational performance."

Jan 1, 2018

By G. C. He

Effects of irregularity, rough surface and aggregation of fine particles on ultrasonic attenuation are significant. The effects should be considered while predicting particle size by ultrasonic attenuation technology. The scanning electron microscope micrographs analysis also shows that particles surface is rough and irregularity. Any slurries has its fractal structure and its special fractal scale and dimension, so, effects of irregularity, rough surface and aggregation of fine particles can be de-scribed by fractal model. The discrepancies between predictions of ultrasonic attenuation based on the assumption of smooth spherical particles and data obtained from slurries of irregular particles indicated that there were different fractal structures. The ultrasonic attenuation model was modified by fractal dimensions. The result of experimental data and analogue calculation indicated that pre-dictions of the fractal modification of ultrasonic attenuation model show good agreement with experimental data. On the other hand, from the values of fractal obtained by inversely calculation, the degree of effects of irregularity, rough surface and aggregation of particles can be estimated. The positive value of fractal dimension indicates that the aggregation has the dominant effect on ultra-sonic attenuation, otherwise, the irregularity and rough surface has the dominant effect.

Jan 1, 2014

By R. Mukherjee

Consistency of Run-Off-Mine (ROM) quality plays an important role in mineral processing which is not very often talked about. The major impediment is limitation of sampling ROM ore, which makes processing plants to run without any realtime feedback on ore quality that comes in. The process of direct determination of Run-Off-Mine (ROM) ore quality is expensive and time consuming as drawing and preparing representative samples from blasted muckpiles are constrained by large sample size and inherent heterogeneity in terms of size and chemistry. In absence of techniques for direct measurement of quality, monitoring and control of ROM, feed to the processing plant at Joda East Mine, like all other iron ore beneficiation plants worldwide, is largely based on blasthole sampling and subsequent chemical analyses of blastcone chips. While such indirect methods proves to be more accurate for representing whole of a mining block or blasted muckpile (~30-50KT/blast), it is indeed a challenge to ascertain and predict day to day input quality for a part there off. This eventually leads to a gap between predicted and actual ROM quality, resulting in difficulties in process control, in turn, and leading to wide swings in product quality. Hence, it is imperative to bridge the gap between predicted and actual ROM quality by arriving at means, which ensure consistent plant feed grade to deliver consistent output. The paper discusses an efficient and affordable alternative for effective prediction of ROM alumina which has been developed by integrating blasthole quality database in GPS based Truck Dispatch System (GPS-TDS) at Joda East Mine. Initially, GPS-TDS has been installed for optimizing production parameters only, but this development has helped in further utilization of GPS-TDS for real time quality monitoring by improving ROM grade prediction and scheduling from several ore blocks in active mining areas. Keywords:run-off-mine (ROM), blast hole, feed grade, GPS-TDS

Sep 1, 2012

The ball level and pulp load play a key role in the operation of industrial scale ball mills. These two operating variables have a significant influence on the performance of the ball mill and any attempts to optimize these devices require manipulating either one or both of these variables. There are several models that can be employed to perform simulations to optimize the performance of industrial ball mills. However, most of these models require ball load and pulp load measurements as inputs to calibrate the model. The changes suggested by the simulator also provide operating regimes that involve moving either the ball level or pulp load and sometimes both of these variables. A ball mill model coded in JKSimMet was used in conjunction with the Sensomag to optimize the secondary ball mill at Waterval concentrator in South Africa. The results show that the perfect mixing ball mill model can be used in conjunction with the Sensomag to optimize the performance of the secondary ball mill.

Sep 1, 2012