Wechat QR code
Wechat QR code
As a strategic resource for new energy, cobalt has broad prospects for recycling cobalt. The recovery of cobalt ore generally requires beneficiation to obtain qualified cobalt sulfide concentrate, and then cobalt extraction. The conventional cobalt ore beneficiation process includes several steps: crushing, grinding, separation, and purification. Let's take a look at the mineral processing technology and mineral processing equipment in each link!
In the production process of the mineral processing plant, the energy consumption of crushing and grinding usually accounts for about 40% to 60% of the total energy consumption, and the cost of crushing and grinding operations usually accounts for more than 50% of the total cost of mineral processing. Therefore, if you want to reduce energy consumption in this link, the mineral processing plant can adopt the method of more crushing and less grinding. According to the different properties of cobalt ore, the two-stage crushing and screening-three-stage grinding and classification process is generally used. If the oxidation rate in copper-cobalt minerals is high, the semi-autogenous grinding (i.e. semi-autogenous grinding + ball grinding) process solution can be used.
The cobalt ore beneficiation equipment used in this stage is mainly crushers, belt conveyors, vibrating screens, ball mills, and classifiers.
Crusher: Jaw crusher is used for coarse crushing and cone crusher is used for fine crushing.
Belt conveyor: It can transport various block and granular bulk materials with an accumulation volume of 0.5~2.5t/.
Vibrating screening machine:Separation of fine-grained minerals in self-centering vibrating screen processing; linear vibrating screens are used for dehydration, desliming, deliquification and removal of heavy media; circular vibrating screens are used for materials Particle size classification.
Ball mill: The lattice type is mainly used for coarse grinding in cobalt ore grinding and beneficiation operations. It is used in one stage of the grinding operation and often forms a grinding and classification process with a spiral classifier; Overflow TypeIn cobalt ore grinding operations, fine grinding or two-stage grinding operations are often performed, often forming a grinding classification process with a cyclone; rod mills are mainly used for fine grinding and coarse grinding operations.
Classifier: The processing capacity of the high weir spiral classifier is 10~1785t/d, and the processing capacity of the submersible classifier is 50~1410t/d.
Cyclone: Single cyclone and cyclone group are available, with processing capacity ≤542m3/h.
There are several cobalt ore separation stages including flotation, gravity separation and magnetic separation. Among them, flotation is the main separation method, while gravity separation and magnetic separation are used as auxiliary separation.
Cobalt ore flotation process
As the main method of recovering cobalt, flotation technology is generally first used to separate cobalt and other metal sulfides. However, the specific method of flotation or suppression of cobalt depends on other valuable minerals and veins contained in the cobalt mineral. Differences in floatability of stone minerals.
For example, copper and cobalt ores can generally be mined by two methods: priority flotation and mixed flotation. The priority flotation method is to select copper first and then cobalt to obtain copper concentrate and cobalt concentrate; mixed flotation is to select cobalt at the same time. First remove the mixed concentrate of copper and cobalt, and then use special flotation reagents to separate copper and cobalt to obtain copper concentrate and cobalt concentrate. The flotation process generally consists of one rough selection, two sweeps, and two selection processes.
The mineral processing equipment used in cobalt mines at this stage is mainly xcf type flotation machine, kyf type flotation machine, sf type flotation machine, jjf type flotation machine, bf type flotation machine, chemical mixing tank and ordinary mixing tank, etc.
XCF/KYF type: The XCF flotation machine is used as a straight chute, and the KYF type flotation machine is used as a slurry suction tank. They are mostly used for roughing and sweeping operations in cobalt ore beneficiation.
JJF type/SF type: The SF type flotation machine is used as a suction tank, and the JJF type flotation machine is used as a straight chute. They are generally used for sweeping and beneficiation operations in medium and large cobalt ore concentrators. .
Bf type flotation machine: In cobalt ore beneficiation plants, it can be combined with other flotation machines to form several groups, and is mostly suitable for coarse-grained cobalt ore beneficiation.
Mixing tank: The high-efficiency mixing tank is used to mix chemicals and slurries. However, if mixed chemicals are used, the different chemicals must be fully mixed with the chemical mixing tank first.
Gravity separation is generally used to separate cobalt sulfide minerals (cobaltite) and cobalt arsenide minerals (arsenic cobaltite) with large specific gravity. It is often combined with flotation to form a gravity-flotation combined beneficiation process.
The mineral processing equipment used in cobalt mines at this stage is: shaking table, spiral chute, jig, etc.
Shaking table: The processing particle size range of shaking table gravity separation is generally 2~0.037mm, which is mostly suitable for processing fine-grained cobalt minerals.
Spiral chute: The processing particle size range of chute gravity separation is 0.1~0.37mm, which is mainly suitable for processing cobalt ore with less mud and finer particle size.
Jig:The processing particle size range of jig gravity separation is 30(20)~0.5mm. In cobalt ore gravity separation operations, it is generally suitable for coarser ore particles.
Cobalt has certain magnetism. Magnetic separation can be used to recover cobalt or perform iron removal operations during sorting. It is usually combined with flotation to form a combined process.
The mineral processing equipment used in cobalt mines at this stage is: Dry magnetic separator、Magnetic roller、Wet strong magnetic separator。
Cobalt ore purification methods are mainly divided into two types. One is that the ore or cobalt-containing waste is pretreated by fire method to initially enrich the cobalt, and then extracted by wet method. The other is to produce cobalt by full wet method. Now the cobalt raw material is leached by wet method, so that the cobalt enters the solution, and the impurities are removed to prepare a pure cobalt solution, and then the metallic cobalt is obtained by electrolysis.
The above is an introduction to the common process flow of cobalt ore beneficiation and an introduction to the method of cobalt smelting to extract cobalt. In an actual mineral processing plant, the cobalt beneficiation process should be determined according to the properties of its ore. Therefore, it is recommended to conduct a beneficiation test first and customize the cobalt beneficiation process plan through analysis to achieve the ideal recovery rate.
Xinhai Mining is a mining enterprise that provides services throughout the mining industry chain. We can conduct beneficiation tests on cobalt ore samples, and design suitable cobalt beneficiation process plans, cobalt beneficiation plant construction plans and complete sets of cobalt ore beneficiation equipment based on the data. If you have any needs, welcome to consult.
Consult
Message
