How to Operate a Small Scale Mine
Any mining engineer with a desire to operate independently, with some financial backing, and with no fear of heavy responsibility and long hours, should be able to make a comfortable living in Mexico. Barring a few inconveniences such as a lack of satisfactory liability or accident insurance, the difficulty of obtaining repair parts for vehicles, […]
Rock Breaking Machine
Anthracite Small power-driven, toothed, cast-iron rolls were used first to break anthracite in 1844. Prior to that time, men with hammers, who stood on perforated cast-iron plates, broke the large lumps into commercial sizes. In order to convert run-of-mine into the various sizes required by the anthracite industry, about 20 million tons must be broken, […]
Shaft Mucking Machines
Hand mucking in shaft sinking operations is no longer necessary because several efficient methods and machines have been devised for this purpose for use in both vertical and inclined shafts. For years shaft sinking was considered the hardest and most dangerous job in mining and, consequently, the turnover in shaft crew was high. High turnover […]
Loading railroad car, truck, or barge
The primary purpose of the loading plant is to transfer the finished product from the preparation machines to the railroad car, truck, or barge in which it is to go to market. Secondary purposes of the loading plant are: to prevent excessive degradation of sizes during loading, to reduce segregation as much as possible, and […]
Method of Preparing Sized Micron Fractions
Study of light adsorption, reaction rates, electrophoresis, particle packing, and corrosion is hindered by lack of a suitable method of preparing small amounts of closely sized materials in the micron and submicron range. Most fractionation methods depend on some form of particle movement through a viscous media in which velocity of a particle, relative to […]
Shaft Sinking
In shaft sinking for coal mines, the cost item greatly influences the method adopted. This holds true especially when soft material must be traversed. The average life of a coal mine is short. This is due either to the limited area of the coal basin or to the great expense of maintenance and haulage underground […]
Interstitial Water Determination
A knowledge of the magnitude of the irreducible interstitial water in a porous medium is so important to petroleum engineering that its determination has become routine in core analyses. In all geological formations there exists, in the pore spaces of the rock structure, water that is held in a state of equilibrium between capillary and […]
Electrolytic Copper Refinery of Slimes
The recent increase in anode copper production at the Noranda smelter placed an additional load on the Montreal East plant of Canadian Copper Refiners Limited. The consequent increase in the amount of anode slimes led to a careful consideration of the various methods of slimes treatment. Characteristics of the Slimes Anode slimes are made up […]
Laboratory Studies on Iron Ore Sintering and Testing
Some of the variables encountered in the sintering of iron ores and their effect on sinter properties have been investigated at the Jones and Laughlin Ore Research Laboratory in Michigan. Ores requiring agglomeration before blast furnace utilization may be classed as coarse, intermediate or fine. Coarse iron ore is considered similar to a —¼-in. Mesabi […]
Effect of Mill Speeds on Grinding Costs
In my opinion, the effect of mill speeds on grinding costs must be studied along with capital investment and dollars gathered together as profits. Comparing the entire groups of operators with those who have had the opportunity to make slow-speed mill studies, I think you will find the latter small in numbers. Most managers want […]