Flowsheet development for low-grade manganese ores by physical and physicochemical methods

Document Type : Research Article

Authors

1 Amirkabir University of Technology, Department of Mining Engineering, Tehran, Iran.

2 Amirkabir University of Technology

3 Faculty of Engineering University of Mohaghegh Ardabili Ardabil Iran

Abstract

In this research, in order to achieve an appropriate flowsheet for processing of low-grade manganese ore, some kinds of beneficiation methods have been investigated and compared. The used ore sample contains an average grade of 13.8% MnO. The valuable mineral containing manganese is pyrolusite, and calcite is the main gangue mineral in the ore. Gravity (jigging and tabling), high-intensity magnetic and flotation (cationic and anionic) methods were examined this study. Among the applied methods, cationic flotation has the highest manganese recovery in the concentrate (77.4%) with a selectivity index of 2.34. The highest grade of MnO in the concentrate is 52.6% with a selectivity index of 4.10, which is obtained using high intensity wet magnetic separation. The highest separation efficiency (almost 54.2%) is also achieved by this method. For developing a suitable flowsheet, the combination of various methods including gravity-flotation (cationic and anionic), gravity-magnetic, and gravity-gravity were examined. Among the combined methods, the combination of tabling and cationic flotation methods has resulted in a concentrate containing 39.9% MnO with an acceptable recovery of 71.5%, which seems more suitable flowsheet for development in the industrial scale.

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