Comminution ball milling

The raw ROM (run of mine) ore is reduced in size from boulders of up to 100 cm in diameter to about 0.5 cm using jaw cmshers as weU as cone, gyratory, or roU-type equipment. The cmshed product is further pulverized using rod mills and ball mills, bringing particle sizes to finer than about 65 mesh (230 p.m). These size reduction (qv) procedures are collectively known as comminution processes. Their primary objective is to generate mineral grains that are discrete and Hberated from one another (11). Liberation is essential for the exploitation of individual mineral properties in the separation process. At the same time, particles at such fine sizes can be more readily buoyed to the top of the flotation ceU by air bubbles that adhere to them. 

Mechanical comminution may be used to form metal powders. Relatively coarse particles are produced by machining, whereas ball mills, impact mills, gyratory cmshers, and eddy mills give fine powders of britde materials. 

A novel comminution device, the roll press, has achieved commercial success [Schoenert, International J. Mineral Processing, 22, 401-412 (1988)]. It is used for fine crushing, replacing the function of a coarse-baU mill or of tertiary crushers. Unlike ordinary roll crushers which crush individual particles, the roll press is choke fed and acts on a thick stream or ribbon of feed. Particles are crushed mostly against other particles, so wear is veiy low. Energy efficiency is also greater than in ball mills. 

A colorless, colloidal precipitate was formed and stirred thoroughly for about 15 minutes, whereupon it was filtered by suction. The raw product thus obtained was washed with water until It contained only about Va% water-soluble salts. After drying for 12 hours In a vacuum apparatus at 60°C and under a pressure of 12 mm Hg, the product had the form of hard pieces. The pieces were comminuted to powder in a ball mill and the powder was passed through a sieve (3,600 meshes per cm ). The small residue on the sieve was again pulverized and passed through the same sieve. The yield was 870 g, or 99% of theoretical, calculated on the assumed formula... 

The S-form can be obtained by treating Copper Phthalocyanine Blue in benzene or toluene with aqueous sulfuric acid in the presence of a surfactant [21], The e-phase is produced by comminution of the a-, 7-, or 8-modification, for instance in a planetary ball mill. The mill base is then aftertreated in an organic solvent at elevated temperature. It is important to realize that the temperature, depending on the solvent, must be kept below the transition temperature at which the e-phase converts to the (3-modification (30 to 160°C). The e-modification is made best from the 7-phase, and the most preferred solvents are alcohols [22], For the industrially hitherto insignificant tt, X, and R-forms of Copper Phthalocyanine Blue (see [1], Vol. II, 34-35). 

Figure 12.1. Normalized cumulative size distribution curves of comminuted products, (a) From various kinds of crushing equipment, (b) From rod and ball mills, (c) RRS plots of two curves Taggart, 1951).

FIGURE 17.5 Scanning electron micrograph of steroid crystals comminuted in a wet ball mill to submicron dimensions. (Data generated by NanoSystems, Elan Drug Technologies, a member of the Elan Corporation, pic.)... 

The aim of the paper was to describe the process of grinding of raw materials used in the industrial-scale production of ceramic tiles, by applying the theory of statistical moments. Grinding was performed in industrial ball mills in ceramic tile factories Ceramika Paradyz Ltd. and Opoczno S.A. The ball mills operated in a batch mode. A mixture of feldspars and clay was comminuted. Its composition and fractions depended on the conditions that should be satisfied by raw materials for the production of wall tiles (monoporosis and stoneware) and terracotta. The ground material was subjected to a particle size analysis. Results of the analysis were used in the calculation of relationships applied in the theory of statistical moments. The main parameters, i.e. zero moment of the first order and central moments of the third and fourth order were determined. The values of central moments were used in the calculation of skewness and flatness coefficients. Additionally, changes of mean particle size in time were determined. 

In industrial and laboratory settings the subdivision process more commonly involves the comminution of large particles or aggregates into smaller sizes, either dry with subsequent dispersion (size reduction to the order of a few pm) or directly in a slurry (size reduction to as small as a few tenths of pm). Examples of comminution machines include agitator ball mills, colloid mills, cutting mills, disk mills, homogenizers, jet mills, mechanical impact mills, ring-roller mills, and roll crushers. 

A typical task is the milling of minerals in the pm-range with power consumption of approximately 50 Wh kg-1. A tumbling ball mill would need 1 hour of milling time at a specific power input of 50 W kg-1 for the comminution, a stirred media mill would need 2 min at 1400 W kg-1, a vibration mill 40 s at 4500 W kg-1, and a planetary mill 5 s at 36,000 W kg-1 (Fig. 14.4). 

Interestingly, the ball milling studies of microcrystalline cellulose by Nakai (Table 4) have shown that the Wqj values obtained from water sorption studies increase to a much greater extent than the increase in surface area because of comminution of the sample. In fact, as discussed earlier, moisture sorption was... 

The data listed in Table V illustrate the effect of top mesh size on pyritic sulfur removal. The coal samples were prepared by the same comminution techniques, and consequently the size distribution of the samples should be similar for each case (8, 9, 10, 11, 12). The %,-inch mesh was as received coal, while the 14 X 0 and 100 X 0 mesh samples were obtained by grinding a representative sample in a ball mill until it... 

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