Flotation cells: Sludge level and foam interface measurement

Mining Prosonic M FMU40

Flotation cell arrangement

Flotation cell arrangement

Installed Prosonic M FMU40

Features Prosonic M FMU40 ultrasonic level device with plug in display for on site set-up Compact 2-wire, HART device enables also remote programming Robust IP68/NEMA 4X aluminium housing with R/NPT 1 12 sensor process connection

Benefits Quick on-site setup via a plain language display -time and cost saving due to uniform operating philosophy Excellent 2 mm (0,08) accuracy up to 1 m (3 ft) measuring range (otherwise 0,2 % of adjusted measuring range) Robust non plastic housing Wide measuring range of the Prosonic M series measuring from 25 cm (10) to 15 m (50 ft)

Optimize your Flotation Cells Instruments for control

Typical copper mine separation process Flotation is used in gold, copper, lead, zinc and coal to recover fine mineral particles finer than 0.5 mm (0,02) Cell size ranges from 5 m3 to 200 m3 (178 - 7142 ft3) Cell Control parameters include: Level & interface measurement Slurry pH control Flow meters for frothing agent dosing Slurry flow and valve control using electromagnetic flow meters Application and process description The copper processing area may consist of both oxide and sulphide plants. Oxide and mixed ores are treated by heap-leaching, solvent extraction and electro-winning (SX-EW). Sulphide ore is crushed, ground and treated by flotation. Run-of-mine sulphide ore enters the primary gyratory crusher prior to transport to two parallel grinding circuits, each consisting of a SAG mill and a ball mill. Secondary closed circuit grinding includes cyclone classifiers, from which the overflow feeds the flotation circuit. Flotation concentrate is thickened to 50 % solids for slurry transport in a pipeline to the refinery where it is thickened and filtered before shipment world-wide. Air is blown into the tanks and agitated like a giant blender, producing a foamy froth. The chalcopyrite grains become coated with xanthate molecules with their hydrophobic ends waving around trying desperately to get out of the water. They attach themselves to the oily air bubbles which become coated with chalcopyrite grains as they rise to the surface and flow over the edge of the tank. In this manner through a series of steps the copper ore is concentrated to an eventual value of over 28 % copper. Waste rock particles do not adhere to the bubbles and drop to the bottom of the tank. The waste material that comes out of the bottom of the tanks at the tail end of this process is called tailings. It is nothing more than ground-up rock with the copper minerals removed. Ultrasonic measurement at the flotation cells In flotation, the finely ground ore is mixed with water to form a slurry. Certain chemicals or reagents that only coat the desired copper minerals are added in small amounts. Rising air bubbles capture the coated mineral particles and float them to the surface where they are skimmed off and dried. This dried material is called copper concentrate and is approximately 30 % copper, 27 % iron and 33 % sulphur. Measuring the slurry to bubble interface is important to control the quality of the process. The density of the foam bubbles is high enough to reflect ultrasonic pulses from a continuous ultrasonic level sensor. Using a two channel Prosonic S level transmitter called an FMU90, one FDU91 sensor measures the distance to the bubble surface and the 2nd. FDU91 sensor is measuring the distance to a disk. A float is swimming on the interface slurry / foam. A rod with a disk at the top is fixed on the float. The ultrasonic device is measuring the distance to the disk and so actually measuring the interface. Fig. 1 shows the float and disk arrangement.

Fig. 1

The operating mode Difference h1/h2 on the Prosonic S FMU90 is reading the thickness of the bubble layer.

Instruments International Endress+Hauser GmbH+Co. KG Instruments International P.O. Box 2222 79574 Weil am Rhein Germany Tel. +49 7621 975 02 Fax +49 7621 975 345 http://www.endress.com info@ii.endress.com

CS 008B/11/en/01.05 55001830 IMPR/INDD 2.0