School of Mechanical and Chemical Engineering

SEMESTER 1, 2013 EXAMINATIONS

CHPR3434
Particle Technology
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This Paper Contains: 6 pages (including title page)
Time allowed: 3 hours 10 minutes

INSTRUCTIONS:
a) Answer any 5 questions
b) Allow to take in faculty approved calculator
c) Allow to take in 1 A4 sheet of note written on both sides

PLEASE NOTE
Examination candidates may only bring authorised materials into the examination room. If a supervisor
finds, during the examination, that you have unauthorised material, in whatever form, in the vicinity of your
desk or on your person, whether in the examination room or the toilets or en route to/from the toilets, the
matter will be reported to the head of school and disciplinary action will normally be taken against you. This
action may result in your being deprived of any credit for this examination or even, in some cases, for the
whole unit. This will apply regardless of whether the material has been used at the time it is found.
Therefore, any candidate who has brought any unauthorised material whatsoever into the examination
room should declare it to the supervisor immediately. Candidates who are uncertain whether any material
is authorised should ask the supervisor for clarification.

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Supervisors Only Student left at:

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Question 1
CuSO4 in a slurry of leached roasted copper ore is to be extracted countercurrently in a series
of thickeners. Each hour a charge (feed) consisting of 10,000kg gangue, 1,200kg CuSO4 and
500kg water is to be treated. The strong solution leaving the overflow of the 1st thickener is to
consist of 90% water and 10%CuSO4 by weight. The recovery of CuSO4 is to be 98 percent of
that in the ore. Pure water is to be used as the fresh solvent added in the last thickener. The
slurry leaving each thickener consists of 0.5kg water per kg of gangue plus CuSO4 dissolved in
that water. Equilibrium is attained in each thickener. How many stages are required?
(20 marks)
Question 2
A leaf filter has an area of 0 . 5 m 2 and operates at a constant pressure drop of 500 KPa . The
following test results were obtained for a slurry in water which gave rise to a filter cake regarded
as incompressible.
Volume of filtrate collected ( m
Time (s)

0.1

0.2

0.3

0.4

0.5

140

360

660

1040

1500

Calculate:
a) the time need to collect 0 . 8 m

of filtrate at a constant pressure drop of 700 KPa

b) the time required to wash the resulting cake with 0 . 3 m

400kPa.

of water at a pressure drop of

The governing equation for incompressible cake filtration is given by:

dV
( P ) A 2

dt r ( V LA )

For constant pressure filtration not preceded by constant rate filtration:

t
rL
r

V 2( P ) A2
( P ) A

A is the filtration area, P the pressure difference, v the volume of cake deposited per volume
of filtrate, the viscosity of the suspending medium, V the volume of filtrate, L the filter cloth
resistance expressed in equivalent cake thickness and, r is a constant for an incompressible
filter cake.
(20 marks)

Question 3
A mining company transports its Zinc concentrates via a 300km long slurry pipeline to a
port. The slurry contains 50 wt% solids of concentrates and settle readily. To prevent
sedimentation the flow regime of transport must be turbulent. A laboratory rheological
characterization showed that the flow behaviour of the slurry is Newtonian:

PD
8V
0.054
4L
D

PD
is the wall shear stress, P the pressure difference, L the pipe length, D
4L
the pipe diameter and V the average velocity. If the pipe diameter is 457.2mm (18 inch)
what is the energy requirement in kW hr / tonne km to transport 5000 tonnes of dry
solids per day.
The density of the 50wt% slurry is 2500kg / m 3 . The fanning friction factor-Reynolds
number or f N Re correlation is:
where

16
N Re

for laminar flow and

f 0.0791N Re 0.25
for turbulent flow in a hydraulically smooth pipe. The Reynold number is defined as:
DV
N Re
( PD / 4 L) /(8V / D )

(20 marks)

Question 4
a)
Draw and explain a Closed Crushing Circuit involving only the primary and secondary crushers
(6 marks)
b)
Explain the activation of spheralite (ZnS) in flotation by CuSO4.
(6 marks)
c)
Explain critical pH in flotation. You have a finely ground ore that contains three minerals A, B and C.
Sodium ethyl xanthate is used as collector. At a fixed concentration of the collector, the critical pH for
mineral A, B and C are 3.5, 6.5 and 10.5 respectively. Explain how you would collect these minerals
separately.
(8 marks)
4

Question 5
a)
The results of a typical sieve test are tabulated below:
Sieve size ( m )
-500+250
-250+180
-180+125
-125+90
-90+63
-63+45
-45+20

Mass of ores (g)

0.02
1.32
4.23
9.44
13.10
11.56
4.87

i)

plot the cumulative size distribution in % undersize

ii)

Determine the mean size based on mass

(8 marks)

b)
A hydrocyclone is used to separate mineral sands. The solids concentration of the feed,
underflow and overflow is 52.5, 71.0 and 23.0wt% respectively.
The size analysis for underflow and feed are:
Sieve size ( m )
-800+425
-425+300
-300+210
-210+150
-150+105
-105+75
-75-45

Underflow%
6
24
39
17
10
4
0

feed%
5.0
19.9
33.4
16.7
12.6
9.3
3.1

Determine the inperfection of the cyclone

(12 marks)

Question 6
a)
Assuming that the rate of energy consumption for size reduction is described by a power law
model:

dE
dL

CL

Show that when m=-3/2 , the resultant equation is similar to Bond law

10 W
P

10 W

for polydisperse particles. E is the rate of energy consumption in kW-hr/ton. Wi is the bond work
index. L is the size of particle, P is the 80% passing product particle size and F is the 80%
passing feed particle size.
(10 marks)
b)
The sieve analysis for galena (PbS) ore to be milled in a ball mill are tabulated below:
Sieve size range ( m)
-5000+1000
-1000+500
-500+250
-250+125
-125+90
-90+63
-63

Weight of ores (g)

10.1
18.9
12.4
8.6
7.5
11.6
0.9

After milling the sieve analysis gives the following size distribution below
Using these data:
Sieve size range ( m)
+1000
-1000+500
-500+250
-250+125
-125+90
-90+63
-63+45
-45

Weight of ores (g)

0
0.5
4.7
12.8
14.7
16.8
12.3
8.2

Use the Bonds Law to calculate the grinding energy in kW hr / ton required to achieve the size
distribution. The Bond work index for galena ore is 10.19. If only 1% of the energy input actually
went to size reduction, what is the total input energy?
(10mark)