Salt Lake City Paper - Discussion on Composition of Mill Balls and Determination of Wearing Qualities

The following discussion was held on August 2.2, 1927, during the meeting of the Institute at Salt Lake City. It. IIIatch, Garfield, Utah.—The object of the meeting, I belicve, is to determine the proper chemical composition to insure long wear of a ball in a mill. This might also apply to rods. I feel that there is only one way of determining accurately the wearing qualitites of balls in mills, and that is by actually wearing out 400 or 500 tolls of different kinds of balls. Two things add to the wearing qualities of a ball: (1) the tenacity, with which the particular particles of iron or steel are cemented together; (2) the individual hardness of each partiele. My cxperience is that a ball that has a Brincll of 550 to 650 will give comparatively long life. There is considerable difference of opinion as to the best steel and iron alloys neressary to produce a satisfactory grinding ball. Some favor chrome, somr manganese and some nickel. Personally, I believe cast iron alloyed with chrome makes the best ball for small sizes; for large sizes (31/2 in. arid up) steel alloyed with mangancse is best. L. O. Howard, Pullman, Wash.—How would this method apply to hning? A. Kissock, New York, N. Y.—I do not subcrribe to that exactly. As I am connected with the Climax Molybdenum Co. you would hardly expeet me to. We have been much interested in trying to work out this grinding-ball problem and have spent a, great deal of thought and effort on it. As we are associated with the American Metal Co. and have a number of Proprrties of our own, we are in poaition to try our ideas on ourselves first. We have tried different compositions, but, have not done anything very remarkable with them yet,, except that we have been able to say that the combination of chrome and molybdenum has given the best, wearing ball. Mr. Hatch feels that iron is the best. medium for grinding, hut since toughtiess as well as hardness is a factor in wearability we feel that a well made steel is better for this purpose. Another difficulty with cast, or chilled, iron is lack of uniformity front day to day or from heat to heat, and the impossibility of protlucing balls free from blow or shrinkage holes which matcrially affect their life. If cast iron is made hard it becomes brittle and lacks strctc11 or toughness. This prevents its use in the larger sizes, aS break:lgc, is a sorious hantlic:~p to efficiency. We have trirtl hard and brittle balls and softer but very tough balls and have proved that maximum hardness, with sufficient toughuess to prevent hrcakagv, is the most important factor. in resistarnce of a steel to abrasion. It is well known that. chromium is one of the best hardening agencies for cither iron or. steel; and molybdenum is recognized as an clerment capable of introducing tonghness. In other words, the proper combination of chromium and molybdenum permits unusual hadness with still sufficient touglmess to stand up under severest impact. It is yet too early to give any actual mill results of this new Combination and though we are proving our ideas at our own properties we have to depend on others to help us make the data more general and more worth while and would like to get some testa 206