Lead-Zinc Concentrates Quality Improve by Enhancing Slurry Agitation Process

Abstract

Lead-zinc sulphide ore mined from the Toranica deposit and is processed in the concentrator. The deposit is located in the Osogovo mountain, the northeastern part of the Republic of North Macedonia, near the Bulgarian Macedonian border. The main ore minerals in the lead-zinc ore are represented by galena, sphalerite, chalcopyrite, pyrite, and the non-ore minerals by quartz, carbonates, barite. After crushing and grinding, the ore is beneficiated using a direct selective flotation. It is common knowledge that slurry agitation is important for the flotation efficiency and makes the mineral particles fully mix with the flotation reagent. It was established that with the available conditioning tank agitator in the Toranica lead-zinc concentrator, the necessary slurry agitation is not achieved. This leads to inefficient flotation process and low-quality Pb and Zn concentrates production. During certain periods of the concentrator's operation, a zinc concentrate with an average monthly content of lead impurities is produced, reaching up to 6.08%, while at the same time a lead loss was registered in the final flotation tails. To eliminate the causes leading to deteriorate technological indicators, the lead-zinc ore mineral composition was investigated. Moreover, slurry agitation has been improved by implementing an advanced conditioning tank. High-quality final concentrates production was achieved, and the recovery degreewas also increased. This paper is organized divided into four sections. Section 1 gives a brief overview of sulphide lead-zinc ores, their flotation beneficiation, reagents and flowsheets. The second section examines our research and development program to establish the technological possibilities for replacement of an available conditioning tank agitator. In the third section the case study is analyzed, and we propose a new procedure for conditioning tank agitator improvement. Our conclusions are drawn in the final section