Hydrophobic Frothers for Mineral Processing
Frothers Development and testing by : Levi Guzman Rivera Moly-Cop Adesur S.A
Introduction • Froth flota otation is a highl ghly interactive system including water chemistry, pH, hidrodynamic, particle size, etc. • The answ nswer app appe ears to to be be tha thatt changing frother chemistry structure could improve metallurgical performance • Moly-Cop Adesur S.A has been involved in developing new frother chemistry.
Overview r u s e e d c A n e i p r o e C - p x y l E o M
A long experience with the frother business, due to since 1987 to 1992 was the exclusive representative of Ore Prep Chemicals. Chemicals.
In 1992 was formed Mineral Reagents International Inc., Moly-Cop Adesur S.A. was chosen to be one of the pilot business unit for testing and developing new frothers under under Dr. Dr. Richard Richard Klimpel Klimpel direct direction. ion.
Overview r u s e e d c A n e i p r o e C p - x y E l o M
In 1994 Armco signed an agreement with Dow Chemical Co. to commercialize Dowfroth mining products and manufacture new chemical products for mining industry In 1998 Moly-Cop Adesur Adesur S.A. S.A. built its own blending facility in Callao– Lima. In 2002 Moly-Cop relocated its blending Anita – Lima.
Adesur S.A. facility facility To Sta Sta
BLENDING AND STORAGE FACILITIES • Total Area 2,000 m2 • Storage capacity : • 1 tk 60,000 gl • 6 tks 10,000 gl • Blending Capacity : • 2 tks 8 Mt / batch • 400 Mt/mth
FROTHERS EVOLUTION - OVERVIEW
Frothers Generation I
Naturally Derived materials as: •Pine oil •Cresilic acid •Xilenol
Inexpensive to
moderately priced • Very variable in quality • Environmentally regulated
FROTHERS EVOLUTION - OVERVIEW
Frothers Generation II
Alcohols
• Inexpensive to
• Glycols
moderately priced
• Polyglycols methyl ether
• Consistent in quality
• Modified Alcohols
•Environmentally not
• Carbonyl materials
regulated
• Effective used alone.
FROTHERS EVOLUTION - OVERVIEW
Frothers Generation III
• • • •
Taylor made blendings Alcohol/Poliglycol High MW Alcohol Polyglicol Type
• Inexpensive to moderately priced • Consistent in quality • Effective used alone • Low dosage • Environmentally not regulated
MOLY-COP FROTHERS DEVELOPMENT
r e s h t e i o r l i F m n a i F a M
Alcohol group
Alkoxys group
Polyglycols group
FROTHERS FAMILIES DESCRIPTION
l o h o p c u l a o r e g h T
Alcohol group generally include 4 to 10 carbon atoms in either linear , branched, cyclical or aromatic form. (R-OH)
Aliphatic alcohols such as MIBC, Hexanol, 2 Ethyl hexanol, has been used extensively
Pine Oil, Cresylic acid, and 2,3 Xilenol have been used industrially for decades, but due to environmental concerns have been almost replaced completely
FROTHERS FAMILIES DESCRIPTION
l o h o p c u l a o r e g h T
Typically such aliphatic alcohol frothers show less tenacity, lower water retention and more brittle froth than other groups.
Alcohols have low water solubility, are the most sensitive to pH changes, and have the highest kinetics rate.
Due the low water retention, gives improved selectivity for slimes, but are not good for coarse flotation.
FROTHERS FAMILIES DESCRIPTION
s y x o p u k l o a r e g h T
This is new frother chemistry of which the best known product is TEB. Those are not extensively used..
Alkoyxs group have good water solubility, and are less sensitive to pH changes
The use characteristic is similar to Pine Oil except that too much dosage does not affect the froth character.
FROTHERS FAMILIES DESCRIPTION
p u o r g l o c y l g y l o P
Polyglycol group represents the maximum flexibility for the flotation engineer when the correct frother is chosen.
The most common families are PGME and PPG frothers, Dowfroth products are representative of this frothers (DF200, DF200, DF1012)
PGME gives improved water retention/drenage action. Show more persistant froths than alcohols. so only one stage dosage is required in most cases.
FROTHERS FAMILIES DESCRIPTION
p u o r g l o c y l g y l o P
When compared to alcohols the recovery at same or higher dosage is usually higher, but at low dosages shows less recovery than alcohols.
PGME and PPG frothers are less sensitive to changes in pH but have slow kinetics compared to alcohols
Are good for coarse or slimes flotation, according to the molecular weight in despite of selectivity.
FROTHER REQUIREMENTS •
s t n s e r e m h t e r i o r u F q e R
Environmentally Safe
• High Kinetics rate of flotation • Froth Stability and volume • Water drainage action • Low sensitivity to changes in Ph • Must break readily • It must readily dispersible • It should be relatively cheap
FROTHER CLASIFICATION
n o s i r t e a c h i t f i o r s F l a C
•
By particle size interaction
• By Kinetics rate • using DFI and CCC
By particle Size interaction FROTHER CHEMICAL STRUCTURE DF-1263
DF-400
DF-1012
DF-250
HEXANOL
DF-200
MIBC 20
30
50
100 70 Particl e size, (micron s)
200
300
500
we can notice that each specific frother is related to an effective particle size ranges of particles, so we can deduct that no one frother structure can generally float the broadness of particle size distribution in flotation process.
By particle Size interaction MIBC
CAPACIDAD DE LEVANTE POR TAMAÑOS
H508
15,00
H225 DF200
o s e13,00 P n e n11,00 o i c a r e 9,00 p u c e R 7,00 %
5,00 10
35
60
85
110
135
160
Tam año de Particula (m icrones)
185
210
235
By particle Size interaction Frother and Particle size interaction 100 y 95 r e 90 v o c 85 e R 80 u C 75 % 70 65
DF250 MIBC H212
1
10
100
Particle Size (microns)
1000
By particle & Molecular Weight 12 E V I T C E L E S
11 10
B L 9 H d e 8 t a l u c l a 7 C
G ly c e r o l ( PO ) n
U L F E R W P O
T402
C H ( C 3 3 H O ) 6 n O H
DF400 DF1012 DF1263
MIBC
6
Hexanol
5
α
T411 MIBC-2PO Hexanol-2PO
-Terpineol
4 0
100
200
300
400
500
600
Molecular Weight
700
800
900
1000
By Kinetics Rate 1 ⎧ ⎫ Ri = R ⎨ 1 − ( ) [1 − exp( − Kt ) ]⎬ Kt ⎩ ⎭
By Kinetics Rate 100 90 80
y r e 70 v o c e 60 r u C 50
C-800 F-501 H-225 H-425 H-525
%
H-530
40
H-602
30 20 0
2
4
6
8
10
Flotation time (min)
12
14
16
18
By Kinetics Rate Flotacion Bulk (Pb-Ag) 100 y 90 r e 80 v o 70 c e r 60 b P 50 ) 40 % ( 30 20
H425 TPG H212 DF250
0
1
2
3
4
5
6
flotation time(min)
7
8
9
10
By Kinetics Rate 95 85
y r e 75 v o c 65 e R u 55 C % 45
H-530 H-525 H-520 H-515 H-501
35 25 0
5
10 Flotation Time (min)
15
20
By DFI and CCC ⎛ ∂rt ⎞ DFI = ⎜ ⎟ ⎝ ∂C ⎠ C ⎯ ⎯→ 0
∆V rt = ∆Q Frother
MIBC HEX DEMPH DEH MPDEH (PO)1 (PO)2 DF-200 DF-250 DF-1012
DFI s.L/mol 34,000 33,000 290,000 94,000 170,000 5,700 35,000 196,000 208,000 267,000
CCC mmol/L 0.11 0.079 0.013 0.031 0.016 0.52 0.17 0.089 0.033 0.015
DFI x CCC S 3.74 2.61 3.77 2.91 2.72 2.96 5.95 18.44 6.86 4.0
By DFI and CCC 2.5 DF200 DF250 DF1012 2
MIBC
) m m ( r e 1.5 t e m a i D r e 1 t u a S
CCC for DF200
CCC for MIBC
0.5 CCC for DF1012
CCC for DF250
0 0
0.1
0.2
Concentration (mmol/L)
0.3
0.4
By DFI and CCC
300000
DEMPH DF1012
) l o 200000 m / L . s ( I F D
DF250
DF200
MPDEX
100000 DEH
HEX MIBC
(PO)1 (PO)2
0 0
0.2
0.4 CCC (mmol/L)
0.6
Conclusions
• Moly-Cop Adesur S.A. research is based in giving to the frother different properties as kinetics, selectivity, grain size floatability, froth stability, these ones are combined to obtain the best metallurgical performance for each application. • The broad of products developed by Moly-Cop Adesur S.A., allows to address specific mineral processing problems by providing the best hydrophobic frother solution.
Conclusions In research work, there were identified some trends in order to improve the frother capability, as follows: • To float slimes and coarse particles • Larger flotation cells require more stronger frother • Alternative equipments (column cells, Flash Flotation, etc) • More complex ores systems (Oxides) • Improve Kinetics rate • ........ many others
Conclusions • Moly-Cop
Adesur
S.A .
supports its products with technical service in terms of testing and developing new products, this work is normally developed with metallurgical personnel so that the problem can be better addressed. •
Currently it has been identified five families of frother for froth flotation denoted as MCFroth (H series), H100, H200, H300, H400 and H500.
Conclusions Need to blending frothers in order to improve particle size flotability
Making frothers more hydrophobic, it is possible to float coarser particles
Need to combine kinetics rate, frother stability, and other properties from different chemical families
