Document Type : Original Research Paper

Authors

• Seyyed Mohsen Zamzami ¹
• Javad Vazifeh Mehrabani ²

¹ a Department of Mineral Processing, Faculty of Mining Engineering, Sahand University of Technology, Sahand New Town, Tabriz, Iran

² Department of Mineral Processing, Faculty of Mining Engineering, Sahand University of Technology, Sahand New Town, Tabriz, Iran

Abstract

In this research, solid phase settling process from the liquid phase were optimized simultaneously on the different responses, using the response surface methodology (RSM). The effect of solid percentage, flocculant dosage, temperature, and pulp pH were evaluated on the responses of solid settling velocity, water turbidity, viscosity and density of settled pulp. The results showed that by increasing the flocculant dosage from 0.5 to 3.5 g/ton, settled pulp viscosity decreases from 49.05 cSt to 17.54 cSt. The higher values of pulp pH as well as low amount of solid percentage resulted in high water turbidity, which shows the lack of contact between flocs and suspended particles. The results indicated that the pulp solid percentage and the flocculants dosage are the most significant parameters on the responses. Optimum test conditions were obtained in industrial mode by using 5 g/t flocculant, solid percentage 23.96%, pH=7.5 temperature of the pulp 21.5°C in which condition, settling rate, pulp viscosity, pulp density and water turbidity were predicted to be 13.23 cm/min, 5.1 cSt, 1.61 g/cm³ and 15.7 NTU respectively. Repetition test in the model predicted optimum condition was carried out and verified the predicted optimized condition.

Keywords

• Settling rate
• Tailing
• optimization
• RSM
• flocculation

Main Subjects

• Mineral Processing