Physical restrictions of the flotation of fine particles and ways to overcome them

Karakashev, Stoyan I.; Grozev, Nikolay A.; Özdemir, Orhan; Güven, Onur; Ata, Seher; Bournival, Ghislain; Batjargal, Khandjamts; Boylu, Feridun; Hristova, Svetlana; Çelık, Mehmet

doi:10.37190/ppmp/153944

Cited by 3 publications

(19 citation statements)

References 54 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…Another reason can be the nature of fine and ultrafine particles as the collector rubbers and their readily high collector dosage requirements for being recovered. Further reasons for poor recovery of fine and ultrafine particles can be found elsewhere [43,44]. However, since the H-16 cell provided a high shear intensity on the aerator, the surface oxidation layers as well as slime coatings could be removed, which led to favorable adsorption of reagents on the particle surfaces and ultimately grade and recovery improvements.…”

Section: Results Of Industrial Surveysmentioning

confidence: 99%

ImhoflotTM Flotation Cell Performance in Mini-Pilot and Industrial Scales on the Acacia Copper Ore

Hassanzadeh,

Gungor,

Samet

et al. 2024

Minerals

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The present work investigates a comparative study between mechanical and ImhoflotTM cells on a mini-pilot scale and the applicability of one self-aspirated H-16 cell (hybrid ImhoflotTM cell) on an industrial scale on-site. The VM-04 cell (vertical feed to the separator vessel with 400 mm diameter) was fabricated, developed, and examined. The copper flotation experiments were conducted under similar volumetric conditions for both the ImhoflotTM and mechanical flotation cells keeping the rest of the parameters constant. Further, one H-16 cell was positioned at four different stages in the Gökirmak copper flotation circuit of the Acacia (Türkiye) copper beneficiation plant, i.e., at (i) pre-rougher flotation, (ii) rougher concentrate, (iii) cleaner-scavenger tailing, and (iv) first cleaning concentrate aiming at enhancing the flotation circuit capacity through flash flotation in the rougher stage, reducing copper grade in the final tailing, and increasing cleaning throughput, respectively. Comparative copper flotation tests showed that ultimate recoveries using the ImhoflotTM and mechanically agitated conventional cells were 94% and 74%, respectively. The industrial scale test results indicated that locating one pneumatic H-16 cell with the duty of pre-floating (also known as flash flotation) led to the enrichment ratio and recovery of 4.84 and 89%, respectively. Positioning the H-16 cell at the cleaner-scavenger tailings could diminish the copper tailings grade from 0.43% to 0.31%. Further, a relatively greater enrichment ratio and copper recovery were obtained using only one ImhoflotTM cell (1.76 and 64%) in comparison with employing four existing mechanical cells (50 m3, each cell) in series (1.45 and 60%) at the first cleaner stage.

show abstract

Section: Results Of Industrial Surveysmentioning

confidence: 99%

ImhoflotTM Flotation Cell Performance in Mini-Pilot and Industrial Scales on the Acacia Copper Ore

Hassanzadeh,

Gungor,

Samet

et al. 2024

Minerals

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Fortunately, there is another more realistic theoretical approach (e.g., [17,18]) accounting for the bubble-particle collisions under high turbulence. This theoretical approach predicts a significantly higher frequency of collisions [13,17]. A recent work of ours [13] concluded that the problem consists of the low efficiency of the collisions.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 84%

“…This theoretical approach predicts a significantly higher frequency of collisions [13,17]. A recent work of ours [13] concluded that the problem consists of the low efficiency of the collisions. Analysis based on the capillary theory of Scheludko et al [19] indicated the existence of a thermodynamic lower size limit of the fine particles to float [13] in the nano-scale range, which is weakly dependent on the size of the bubbles.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 84%

See 1 more Smart Citation

Surface Chemistry Tuning Solutions for Flotation of Fine Particles

et al. 2023

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

This paper analyses the basic obstacles preventing the fine particles from floating and suggests solutions for the wetting zone between the bubble and the particle during their collision. It has been shown in our recent paper that the basic problem of fine particle flotation is not the low frequency of collisions with the bubbles, but it consists of the efficiency of these collisions. Moreover, there exists a thermodynamic lower size limit for flotation of fine hydrophobized particles in the sub-micron range, and it is weakly dependent on the size of the bubbles. It was shown that fast flotation with high recovery of fine particles can be achieved by means of: (i) electrostatic attraction between particles and bubbles; (ii) a significant increase in the level of their hydrophobicity; (iii) existence of fine bubbles in the flotation cell. It was shown as well that the drainage of the wetting film between bubbles and particles is unimportant, but the deformation of the bubble by the particle during their clash plays a major role in its rupturing. Electrostatic attraction between bubbles and fine silica particles was achieved with hexylamine. It causes a moderate increase of their hydrophobicity from contact angle = 39.5° ± 2.5° to contact angle = 51.7° ± 7.5° and gave almost 90% recovery within 2 min. Unfortunately, the selectivity of this collector is unsatisfactory if the fine silica particles are mixed with fine magnesite particles. It was shown that even being hydrophilic, the recovery of fine particles can jump to almost 50% if strong electrostatic attraction with the bubbles exists. It was demonstrated as well with the collector hexamethyldisilazane causes significant increase of the hydrophobicity of the fine silica particles (contact angle ≈ 90°) results in skin flotation with 100% recovery when alone and 97% recovery when being mixed with fine magnesite particles (51/49). A new collector significantly increasing the hydrophobicity of magnesite fine particles was tested (disodium dodecyl phosphate) resulting in 89% recovery of fine magnesite particles alone and about 98% recovery in a mixture with fine silica particles.

show abstract

“…Additionally, the interaction between PPG600 and DAH led to a mutual synergistic effect, resulting in enhanced froth performance. This in turn resulted in finer bubble sizes, which affected the flotation recoveries of very fine particles [49][50][51][52][53].…”

Section: Micro-flotation Experimentsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Correlation of Flotation Recoveries and Bubble–Particle Attachment Time for Dodecyl Ammonium Hydrochloride/Frother/Quartz Flotation System

Batjargal,

Güven,

Ozdemir

et al. 2023

Minerals

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Recent studies in the flotation of fine particles have necessitated new techniques and analyses for developing various strategies. Particularly, the improvements in flotation chemistry including the selection of the type of frother, collector, and other reagents have become very significant. In this study, the effect of different commercial polypropylene glycol frothers (PPG200, 400, and 600) in the presence of dodecylammonium hydrochloride (DAH) was investigated for their contribution to flotation recoveries and bubble–particle attachment time values of fine quartz minerals. Zeta potential measurements with DAH were also carried out as a function of pH and reagent concentration to justify the effect of collector usage alone on the charge of particles. A linear increase in flotation recoveries against collector concentration, e.g., 7.4% recovery at 1 × 10−5 mol/L DAH and 65.4% recovery at 1 × 10−3 mol/L DAH, was obtained. In this context, the contribution of frothers was particularly important in that a recovery of 15.91% in the absence of the frother and a modest increase to 19.70% was obtained upon the addition of PPG600 at its critical coalescence concentration (CCC) of 3 ppm. Finally, a strong correlation was found between the bubble–particle attachment time and flotation recovery as a function of collector concentration (lowest attachment time vs. highest flotation recovery). The latter correlation is very promising because bubble attachment time leads to various micro-mechanisms in flotation including bubble film thinning, bubble rupture, and induction time, and consequently, frother efficiency in the presence and absence of a collector. As a result, the experimental findings were gathered to achieve a consistent base for further fundamental studies on the application of the synergistic effect of frothers and collectors in the flotation of fine particles.

show abstract

Physical restrictions of the flotation of fine particles and ways to overcome them

Cited by 3 publications

References 54 publications

ImhoflotTM Flotation Cell Performance in Mini-Pilot and Industrial Scales on the Acacia Copper Ore

ImhoflotTM Flotation Cell Performance in Mini-Pilot and Industrial Scales on the Acacia Copper Ore

Surface Chemistry Tuning Solutions for Flotation of Fine Particles

Correlation of Flotation Recoveries and Bubble–Particle Attachment Time for Dodecyl Ammonium Hydrochloride/Frother/Quartz Flotation System

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About