Analysis of intra-particle liquid capillary spread mechanisms in high-temperature stope leaching using MRI

Abstract

Capillary penetration is widely existed in stope leaching, both the rate of liquid wetting ore and flow out of ore are affected by it. Stope leaching is carried out in a high-temperature environment when mining minerals with large burial depth. The mechanism of intra-particle liquid capillary penetration mechanisms at high-temperature have not been revealed. In this paper, samples with a size of Φ50 mm × 100 mm were selected for quantitative analysis. The capillary rise behaviour inside samples with different porosity were detected at 30 °C, 40 °C and 50 °C by using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). In most cases, capillary rise height is underestimated when the outside wetting line is used as an indicator, because the rise height inside the sample is greater. The liquid capillary rise height increased slightly with the temperature, whereas the wetting surface profile remained unchanged. The capillary rise rate increased significantly with porosity, mainly due to the increase of internal effective porosity. The results help to understand the liquid penetration behaviour under high-temperature stope leaching condition, and lay a theoretical foundation for improving the liquid permeability.