Study On Frother Performance And Its Effect On Sulfide Flotation

Frother is an indispensable reagent in froth flotation. As various frothers spring up and ore property becomes increasingly complicated, it is necessary to propose a feasible and effective method to evaluate frother performance and investigate the relation between frother performance and sulfide flotation behavior systematically, serving as reference and basis for selecting appropriate in flotation.A comprehensive method of evaluating frother performance was proposed in this paper. Four widely-used frothers, i.e. MIBC, BK201, Terpenic oil and2-Ethylhexanol, being as research objects, their surface activity, foaming ability, foam stability, foam viscocity and foam water recovery in gas-liquid system were tested and relationship among these performance was discussed. Results show that frothers with strong surface activity and low foam viscosity are generally has better foam stability and higher foam water recovery.Based on the above test results, relation between frother performance and single mineral flotation of quartz and pyrite as well as their artificially mixed mineral flotation was investigated. Results show that thanks to their good foam stability, low foam viscosity and high water recovery, BK201and tepernic oil make quartz entrainment degree higher and thus obtain lower concentrate grade;2-Ethylhexanol, due to its strong foaming ability and low foam viscosity, makes the weakest quartz entrainment, thus obtaining the highest concentrate grade, but its worse foam stability is unfavorable for pyrite flotation and thus obtains the lowest concentrate recovery; MIBC, owing to its strong foaming ability, low foam viscosity, appropriate foam stability and water recovery, makes quartz entrainment degree low and pyrite floating percentage high, thus obtaining the highese concentrate recovery.On the basis of the above studies, taking a copper sulfide ore from Manzhouli, Inner Mongolia as an example, further investigation on the relation between frother performance and mineral flotation behavior was carried out tnrougn trotncr contrast tests, whole llow open circurt tests and closed circuit tests. Results show that the descending order of copper grade in concentrate is2-Ethylhexanol, MIBC, BK201, and terpenic oil; that of copper recovery is MIBC, BK201, terpenic oil, and2-Ethylhexanol. The results correspond to thoses obtained in single mineral flotation tests, demonstrating that the proposed method is effective and the conclusion is reasonable.51Figures,14Tables,78References.