Evaluation of different crushing equipment's in the mineral liberation in pre-concentration circuits

• Grant number: 20/10190-5
• Support type: Scholarships in Brazil - Scientific Initiation
• Effective date (Start): November 01, 2020
• Effective date (End): October 31, 2021
• Field of knowledge: Engineering - Mining Engineering - Ore Beneficiation
• Principal researcher: Maurício Guimarães Bergerman
• Grantee: André Hiroshi Asakawa
• Home Institution: Escola Politécnica (EP). Universidade de São Paulo (USP). São Paulo , SP, Brazil

Abstract

The use of more complex operations of comminution and concentration of minerals in the mineral industry has grown due to ore grade reduction and greater complexity of the available minerals. An alternative to face rising installation and operation costs of mineral processing plants is pre-concentration, using magnetic concentration, gravimetric concentration and high-tech sensors (ore sorting). The benefits produced by the use of pre-concentration are substantial, among which can be cited: increase in the production of metal contained in the ore or processed in a plant without the need to perform an expansion of the milling and flotation circuits capacity, and the reduction of costs upon the disposal of fine tailings in dams, since a large part of the tailings is discarded in coarse granulometry in the pre-concentration, allowing the use of piles. However, few studies evaluated the impacts that different types of crushing may have on mineral liberation and, consequently, on the pre-concentration stage. This research project aims to assess the impact of different types of crushing using cone crushers, jaws crushers, impact crushers and high pressure grinding rolls as a secondary and/or tertiary crushing stages on mineral release. An evaluation will be carried out on a sample of sulfide copper ore or iron ore, from a Brazilian mining enterprise.