Froth Flotation (Sulphide & Oxide)

Froth Flotation (Sulphide & Oxide)

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High carbon content ore contains ultrafine gold (1 reply)

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sayf-alawneh
5 months ago
sayf-alawneh 5 months ago

I have an ore thats coming from 2km depth , this ore is pitch black since it has a very high content of carbon and it has natural oil also  and sulphides , an xrd test showed that the ore has a good content of ultrafine gold (100 g/ton ) at least and traces of rhodium, i grinded the ore down to 75 microns and tested its gold content using mercury but the mercury could only extract 15% of the expected gold , a direct cyanidation process will of course fail since the carbon will continuously absorb the gold from the auro-cyanide solution , a roasting process is a choice but its costy since the high content of carbon , so i though about froth flotation process to get rid of the oil and the carbon , but before doing this , my question is : is there a probability that the natural oil and the carbon contained in the ore may form an agglomeration that absorbs gold ? If so then getting rid of carbon using froth flotation process will fail so is there a way to stop the formation of agglomeration during the flotation process of carbon ?

By the way i tried doing a direct flotation for gold using 1kg sample , i used xanthate as collector and copper sulfate as activator and starch as depressor for carbon matter i didnt use an oil since the ore already contains oil and the result was crazy , the froth concentrate was contaminated with carbon and weighted about 150 grams , any suggestion will be appreciated , thank you in advance 

Sayf 

J
Jorge
5 months ago
Jorge 5 months ago
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Gold deposits containing carbon compounds have a different behavior  during flotation. It is important to evaluate a flotation scheme for a particular ore. I am going to mention some possible alternatives that you can evaluate with your met lab.

  • Some time ago, at McIntyre Porcupine quebracho was added to depress gold bearing minerals and the carbonaceous component was floated adding fuel oil and MIBC.
  • A mixture of dextrine guar and lignosol may work as graphite gangue depressant, and a gold bearing minerals are floated using a promoter (Aerofloat) and a polyglicol frother.
  • It is possible to consider two flotation stages.  The first one may help to float the carbon with kerosene followed by depressing the remaining carbon with CMC and floating gold bearing minerals.
  • The addition of MIBC is typical to flotat carbon compounds, but sometimes the frother is absorbed. The addition of diesel oil could MIBC consumption by 40 to 60% and an alternative frother like a polypropylene glycol  can be added to get the balance.
  • The addition of nitrogen as flotation gas is other alternative to consider to minimize the flotability of carbon.

 

 

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