Search Documents

By George J. Young

(San Francisco meeting, October, 1911.) THE nature of slimes handled in the treatment of gold- and silver-ores has been discussed in technical literature to a considerable extent. The subject of slime-filtration from the practical worker's stand-point has also received much comment, and scattered through the literature of the subject are descriptions of many slime-filtration installations. Articles of this nature serve a valuable purpose and assist materially in the design of new and the improvement of old plants. The subject of the physics of slime-filtration has been touched upon to only a slight extent. The underlying principles are worthy of more intensive study and experimentation than they have received, and the main purpose of this paper is to present the results of such study and experimental work as will serve to make clear in part at least many of the principles which control the filtration of slime. Nature of Slime. Much has bean written concerning an accurate definition of the term ? slime," but no comprehensive definition seems to be generally accepted. The reason for this is clear. A slime consists of at least three different substances, each, when separated, possessing distinctly different physical and to a certain extent chemical properties. These substances are extremely fine sand, a colloidal material which may be and generally is in a coagulated condition, and a colloidal material which is in a non-coagulated condition. Suspending a slime in a relatively large volume of water by shaking and allowing sedimentation to take place, results in the fine sand settling out with comparative rapidity, followed by the coagulated material, which settles much more slowly and finally a certain portion remains

Nov 1, 1911

By H. Walqui

The Empire concentrator was built in four stages, with the latest stage accounting for 50% of the overall plant capacity. Over the past 5 years, the average throughput of the three grinding lines has decreased by 50 LTPH (15%) without significant changes in ore characteristics and despite the addition of secondary grinding capacity to supplement the existing pebble mills that are the constraint of the grinding circuit. This paper discusses the different areas under study that are aimed at optimizing grinding circuit utilization which includes improving system logic, pebble crushing operation and pebble mills operation.

Jan 1, 2009

By Donald J. Hill

To be successful, every organization within the mining industry must involve itself in researching and evaluating methods of loss control. The appraisal and evaluation of accidents and injuries is required to determine the costs of loss producing practices and conditions. This involves all of an organizations disciplines that concern themselves with a more efficient and cost effective organization. To come to know the cost of your safety program or how much is expended yearly for each employee on safety; to know what your safety costs are per man-hour or per ton-produced; to know what the health, medical and compensation costs are for any given incident are just a few of the important facts and figures that the safety management of a given organization needs to know to operate in the mining industry today.

Jan 1, 1984

By R. R. Wells, K. C. Vincent, A. O. Ipsen

"INTRODUCTION The Philipsburg Mining District, Granite County, Mont., has been the largest producing area for battery-grade manganese (70 percent MnO2) in the United States since the First World War. Two companies, the Trout Mining Division of the American. Machine & Meals Co., and the Moorlight Mining Co., have intermittently mined and milled 120 to 250 tons of 25-percent manganese ore per day for the production of concentrates of this grade.Investigation of the district by engineers of the Federal Geological Survey and Bureau of Mines indicated that further exploration and develop¬ment would make available additional oxide and carbonate manganese ores for milling and production of metallurgical-grade manganese. If the battery-grade producers converted their plants to the production of metallurgical-grade concentrates, their production also could be increased through greater recoveries.Until February 1, 1944, the Metals Reserve Company, through its agent, the Sunshine Mining Co., purchased milling-grade manganese oxide and carbonate are for stock-piling at Philipsburg. After that time, only carbonate ore was purchased. Based upon the assumption that the stock pile was a true cross-section sample of the producing area, metallurgical studies were made on representative samples from the Metals Reserve stock piles. Testing also was conducted on two other samples of Philipsburg oxide manganese ore obtained by engineers of the Bureau of Mines from the Little Dandy claim of the Donlan group and from the Marie mine. All ore samples tested were found to be amenable to concentration by ore-dressing methods for the production of concentrates that when sintered met Metals Reserve Company specifications for metallurgical-grade manganese."

Nov 1, 1947

The system of keeping geological plans and sections for the Geco Mine at Manitouwadge, Ontario, is described. Special methods employed to save draughting time with-out sacrificing accuracy, such as the extensive use of black line prints, are discussed. The uses made of the plans and sections by the mine planning engineers in their designs of stopes, and by the blast-hole engineer in ~is preparation of blast-hole layouts, are noted. An unusual scheme for portraying the distribution of .copper, zinc and silver values within the ore zone is de-scribed. The method of estimating the grade of ore to be "blasted in each ring of blast holes is outlined, as is the method of estimating the annual ore reserves. The design of an effective but simple transparent geo-logical and mine development model, used as a display for -visitors, is discussed. A large-scale model used for the study of problems in geological structure is also de-scribed.

Jan 1, 1964

By VIVEK KASHYAP, EVODY TSHIJIK KARUMB, PATRICK TAYLOR

Zinc ferrite is considered an integral phase of zinc residues as their presence can render the processing of zinc and critical metals difficult. It is a refractory phase, formed at high temperature in the presence of zinc (Zn) and iron (Fe) during oxidative roasting in zinc processing plants. Because it is refractory to efficient leaching, unreacted zinc ferrite gets concentrated in the final zinc residue, making it a viable source of zinc and indium extraction. The refractory nature of zinc ferrite makes the extraction of associated critical metals difficult. In order to explore a potential economic and carbon-neutral zinc ferrite processing technique, our previous study proposed the partial reduction of zinc ferrite followed by sulfuric acid leaching of the roasting product [1-3]. As demonstrated in our previous studies, partial reduction of zinc ferrite results in a mixture of ZnO, Fe3O4 and FeO, which can be further subjected to leaching for efficient extraction of zinc and critical metals such as gallium and indium.

Dec 1, 2022

By G. P. Contractor

Medium and low carbon steels, modified with uranium, were studied in order to evaluate the influence of uranium on forge ability, mechanical 11roperties, response to heat treatment and microstructure. Uranium contents ranged up to 0.70 per cent. The medium carbon steels are hot short if the uranium content exceeds about 0.35 per cent. More uranium can be tolerated in low carbon steels. The hot shortness is caused by the formation of intergranular phase UFe2. Critical transformation temperatures, Jominy hardenability, and resistance to tempering are not significantly affected by the 11resence of uranium. Similarly, uranium has little or no effect on the tensile properties of carbon steels. The addition of uranium has a favourable effect 11n the stress-rupture characteristics and some beneficial effect on fatigue properties. However, more results are required for verification. In the steels investigated, it seems that most of the uranium carbide combines to form complex inclusions of U (0, C, N) or (C, N), rich in oxygen or nitrogen or both.

Jan 1, 1963

By L. J. Defferding

This report documents the work performed by Battelle-Northwest and its sub-contractors in Phase I of a project to develop a cross pit conveyor system for the Bureau of Mines. The conveyor system description includes details of the conceptual design as well as system and component specifications. The selection of primary and back-up sites for system demonstration is discussed. Maneuvers and operating sequences required for mining the selected demonstration site are described and illustrated in detail. Economic viability of the cross pit conveyor system was analyzed by estimating the cost of overburden removal per ton of coal using the Battelle-designed concept and comparing these costs to the cost of an available state-of-the-art 30-yd3 dragline operation. Testing and trade-off studies conducted are documented and the results presented. Alternate designs considered in developing the selected cross pit concept are included for completeness. Based on the evaluation of the selected concept, it was concluded that the cross pit conveyor system proposed by Battelle is a technically and economically feasible overburden handling method with a good potential to improve western coal mining efficiency.

Jan 1, 1976

By B. C. Williams

The Bureau of Mines monitored the water quality in and near a copper/gold tailings impoundment. Samples were taken from the unsaturated %one. and dissolved concentrations of over ZO constituents were measured with respect to depth and moisture content, factors which influence oxygen content and sulfide oxidation. Samples from the unsaturated %one were drawn through a hypodermic needle sampler into individually evacuated vials fitted with septa, thus preventing oxygen contamination. Water quality was also monitored in the saturated tailings, underlying colluvial aquifer, and weathered andesite bedrock.

Jan 1, 1989

Edwin A. SpeRry, Denver, Colo. (communication to the Secretary*) :—Since writing my former paper on this subject I have had several discussions concerning some of the statements contained therein, with men who have had a large experience with the old form of buddle, both in this country and in Cornwall. The present paper gives a brief statement of some of the points debated, together with the arguments and proofs in their substantiation. The first point is the question of the capacity. In my origi-

Jan 1, 1904

By Cyril S., Smith

WE cannot but marvel at the fact that fire is necessary for almost every operation. It takes the sands of the earth and melts them-now into glass, now into silver, minium or other lead or some substance useful to the artist or physician. By fire, minerals are disintegrated and copper produced; in fire is iron born and by fire is it subdued; by fire, gold is purified; by fire, stones are burned for the binding together of the walls of houses.... Fire is the immeasurable, uncontrollable element, concerning which it is hard to say whether it consumes more or produces more." Thus wrote Pliny in his "Natural History," that great collection of fact and error which constitutes the principal contemporary description of Roman technology and which until the seventeenth century was the authority most often quoted and requoted by those who wrote on metals, as on many other subjects.

Jan 1, 1940

By David A. Greenhut

The Kubota surface melting system has been under development since 1975. It has found commercial application on the melting of municipal sludge, and ash from solid waste. The melted product has physical properties allowing its use as a substitute for aggregate in cement and asphaltic construction. This paper describes the surface melting system, its current use and anticipated future use.

Jan 1, 1991

By Robert L. Haffner

When mining operations of The Eagle-Picher Co. began in the Illinois-Wisconsin zinc mining field in 1949, all underground loading of broken ore and waste was by caterpillar-tracked machines. Beginning in 1956 rubber-tired end-loaders were brought in; ultimately they completely supplanted the tracked units. End-loaders proved to have the mobility needed for the mining conditions and additional merit in auxiliary capacities. Eagle-Picher operates five mines in this area; two are entered by shafts and three by inclined adits. Several ore zones, some of which are attenuated over a considerable distance, are worked from the same entry. Consequently underground haulage roads connecting or following these orebodies have attained great length. In addition, working places are often widely separated because of the character of the mining operations which include pillar recovery and extending haulage connections into old workings. At one mine, the haulage distance is 5000 ft on either side of the shaft, at another the maximum one-way distance is 8400 ft, and at another the present road system of 6800 ft is expected to reach 10,000 to 12,000 ft.

Jan 6, 1962

By QUANWEN PU, Yonggang Wei, Bo Li

With the advancement of industrial science and technology, more and more catalysts are used. The spent catalysts produced are solid waste products, which cause environmental pollution if they are not treated. At the same time, the spent catalysts contain some precious metals such as platinum in concentrations that are often higher than in their ore resources. Therefore, the recovery of valuable metals in spent catalysts is a hot research topic at present. However, due to the complex structure of the spent catalysts, dealing with them is a lengthy process. The first step of recovery, enrichment of the spent catalyst, becomes particularly important. In this paper, a pressure solution method is investigated for this purpose, in which the alumina carrier is dissolved and platinum is enriched in the leaching residue.

By Norman R. Ball

"Many people in the mining and metallurgical industries were brought up to embrace Henry Ford's pronouncement that ""History is bunk"" but it is not generally known that the same Henry Ford created and paid for one of the finest technological museums in the Western World. I am aware that many people feel that industry history is something you ask aging executives to do or that history is a clip-andpaste compendium of pictures re-discovered every 25 years or on the occasion of issuing a press release on plant expansion. Moreover, there are many who fear historians as somewhat deranged individuals interested only in corruption, injustice and sensational labour strife. Good history lies somewhere between the controlled P.R. handout and the hysterical attack. Writing good history is a difficult creative act based on the application of experience, insight, wide knowledge and careful reasoning to available evidence. To date, the Canadian mining and metallurgical industries have achieved a great deal but left too little evidence and it is this lack of evidence which must be corrected before it is too late. It is the purpose of this article to stimulate thoughts with regard to archives, one of the more important vehicles for the preservation of such evidence."

Jan 1, 1999

By B. S. Butler

A. D. Mutch (Falconbridge Nickel Mines Ltd., Ona-ping, Ontario)—This contribution is prompted by the fact that the writer has recently published an article'!' which has in part the same general conclusions as B. S. Butler's, namely, the form of the standard mineral paragenesis in hypogene deposits and the parallel transition from early high temperature acid to late low temperature alkaline or neutral solutions. Since the writer also recognizes that he is not fully qualified to discuss the formation of ore deposits as a chemical problem, this discussion will be limited to summarizing other observations and will suggest how Butler's Table II might be made more effective. The form of Butler's table is not unlike that widely used by European geologists'" in which the various minerals are related to the types of ore fluids—peg-matitic, pneumatolic and hydrothermal. Thus the decrease in temperature and change in pH of the ore-bearing fluids as recognized by Butler may also be paralleled by perhaps even greater changes in composition, density, and character. W. H. Newhouse's article:" on the sequence of hypo-gene ore mineral deposition is still one of the most complete analyses of the problem. In it he makes four major observations: 1) The order of O, S, As, Sb is the same as their increasing atomic weights and the same as their melting points. 2) The order of the metallic elements is the same as the Schuermann series. 3) The general mineralogical order is paralleled by decreasing heats of formation. 4) The order is generally in decreasing hardness, higher metal content, and higher specific gravity. The order of 0, S, As, and Bi is also the same as their relative abundance. Another point worth mentioning about this series is that As, Sb, Bi, when abundant, often substitute for sulfur in the early pyrite-like minerals, whereas later in the sequence these elements appear to act more like metals. This behavior may be a further indication of the acid character of the early fluids. C. J. Sullivan"' has attempted to show that the sequence of the metallic elements is related to the order of their melting points and has discussed the interrelationship of the different types of bonding of sulfo-phile and oxiphile elements in minerals. Items 3 and 4 might best be summarized by saying that bonding of the minerals in the series appears to be from ionic to covalent to metallic, the early minerals being light in weight, hard, and near-transparent; the intermediate minerals of intermediate weight, semi-transparent, and semi-conducting; and the end minerals heavy, soft, and malleable, opaque and good conductors. A rapid fall in temperature has been assumed to be the cause of ore deposition in many deposits. Perhaps this in turn is the effect of a rapid release of energy in the form of pressure release and change of volume, the first minerals to form being those with the highest heats of formation which absorb the released energy the most rapidly. Butler's Table II could probably be streamlined and made more effective if the listed compounds were assembled as mineralogical groups as in Dana. Thus the sulfides, arsenides, antimonides, bismuthides, and sulfa salts could be arranged in AX,, AX, A2X2, etc. groups. Since these are continuous substitution series, in which the fields of stability and the heats of formation of the various individual minerals can be fairly regarded as similar, this should be accomplished with no loss of clarity. The occurrence of the individual minerals and the precise sequence of the mineral deposition in any one deposit is probably more dependent on the concentration and relative abundance of the component elements. The assembling of geological data in tabular form such as Butler's Table II will continue to be a very effective method of studying geological phenomena. The importance of this particular problem has been pointed out by C. F. Park,% who concludes that understanding of mechanisms of the standard paragenesis and interrelated problems of mineral zoning in space and time is one of the major keys to classification of ore deposits.

Jan 1, 1959

By Mirko Martini, Marcelo Benaglia, Andrea Codalli

Riachuelo Lot 3 forms part of a sanitation programme being implemented in Argentina to relieve the Riachuelo river basin from its current contamination. The programme, by far the most important in its kind in the country during the last decades, will expand the sewage capacity of Buenos Aires and will benefit an area of 4.3 millions inhabitants by intercepting a number of waste water discharges and conveying them to a new treatment plant prior to final discharge into the Rio de la Plata. The project foresees amongst other works the construction of an onshore 48 m deep shaft at the outlet of the treatment plant plus a 4,3 m inner diameter outfall tunnel of 12 km length. The last 1.5 km of the alignment is fitted with 34 vertical risers jacked from inside the tunnel to allow the discharge and dilution of the treated effluent into the Rio de la Plata. This paper describes the peculiarities and challenges, both in terms of design and in terms of construction, of the outfall tunnel, which was entirely bored under the Rio de la Plata using a 5.2 m cut diameter Tunnel Boring Machine (TBM). On one hand, the tunnel segmental lining was designed to work in tension during the system flow rate peaks while on the other the tunnel excavation faced a variety of complex conditions, such as crossing water bearing permeable soft ground formations and advancing at face pressures in excess of 3,5 bars for the entire route.

Jun 13, 2021

By D. Bienstock, J. H. Field, M. J. Lempel

A computer program is presented to perform the detailed and numerous calculations required for determining the interface temperatures and steady - state heat flow through a furnace wall composed of several refractories in layers . A method is developed that will allow the designer to determine the various thicknesses for each refractory layer to minimize either the total wall thickness or the cost of the wall per unit of area . A sample problem is presented and analyzed to illustrate the techniques involved .

Jan 1, 1964

By A. C. Stevenson

"There are many critical application issues that affect all AC drives, but there are several that are absolutely mandatory for pulse width modulated (PWM) AC drives. If these rules are not followed, the drive system will have insulation, bearing EMI or noise problems. Pulse Width Output VoltageFigure 1 shows the output current of a typical pulse width modulated (PWM) drive. This is, of course, not a clean sine wave thus will have a lot of very significant harmonics. In fact, the harmonic spectrum is directly related to multiples of the carrier switching frequency plus side bands related to the basic output frequency. A typical spectrum for a PWM source bridge switching at 5 kHz is shown in Figure 2. Notice that the spectrum has multiples of the 5 kHz switching frequency and the number of side bands gets larger as the harmonic number increases.IGBT Switching TransientsWhenever we have PWM inverter switching, voltage transients are formed that propagate (usually at about half the speed of light) down the power cables to the motor just like in a radio frequency transmission line. If we do not terminate these transmission lines (motor cables) properly, the voltage pulses will be reflected when they reach the motor end and will be transiently increased up to twice their original amplitude.This transient voltage rise, shown in Figure 3, is important for three reasons:1. Insulation Voltage Stress — Higher voltage stress in the motor connecting cables and motor insulation will lead to a shorter insulation lifetime. If any of the voltage transient peaks exceed the insulation corona discharge level (partial discharge level), the insulation will gradually degrade with each voltage pulse. When it has been sufficiently degraded, it will then fail.Most new “inverter rated” motors have triple layer insulation which has a 1600 to 2000 volt partial discharge level. This will make them suitable to withstand the double voltage peak transient from a 600 volt inverter. It is wise to make sure of this fact, since a “standard” induction motor will only withstand about 1200 volts. Use of a standard motor in this application would shorten its life drastically. This can sometimes be as little as a matter of hours."

Jan 1, 2000

By James E. Simpson, Suresh V. Garimella, III de Groh

"An experimental and numerical study of the horizontal Bridgman growth of pure succinonitrile (SCN) and of a succinonitrile-1.0 mol. % acetone alloy (SCN-1.0 mol. % ACE) has been performed. Experiments at growth rates of 0, 2 and 40 µmis were investigated. The solid/liquid interface was stable (non-dendritic and non-cellular); however, it was not flat. Rather, it was significantly distorted by the influence of convection in the melt and, for the growth cases, by the moving temperature boundary conditions along the ampoule. For the alloy, the interface was determined to be unstable at growth rates greater than 2.8 µmis, but stable for the no-growth and 2 µmis growth cases. When compared to the pure SCN interface, the alloy interface forms closer to the cold zone,· indicating that the melting temperature has been suppressed by the addition of the alloying element. Two-dimensional computer simulations were performed for the no-growth case for both the pure and alloy materials. These simulations indicate that a primary longitudinal convective cell is formed in the melt. The maximum magnitude of velocity was calculated to be 1.515 mmls for pure SCN and 1. 724 mm/s for the alloy. The interface shape predicted by the computer simulation agrees well with the experimentally determined shape for the pure SCN case. In ongoing work, numerical simulations of the process during growth conditions are being performed.IntroductionIncreasingly, advanced materials used in the aerospace, automotive, optics and electronics fields require low levels of defects and high levels of solute uniformity. Directional solidification by the Bridgman process is widely used for synthesis of these high-quality materials. During Bridgman crystal growth, heat and mass transfer by both thermal and solutal gradient-driven convection and diffusion influence the shape of the solid/liquid interface and dopant segregation levels, and hence, directly determine the final crystal quality. Key process parameters include the applied furnace temperature distribution and rate of translation, ampoule properties and furnace orientation."

Jan 1, 1999