ENRICHMENT OF APATITE-BEARING IRON ORE BY MAGNETIC SEPARATION AND FLOTATION

Abstract

In this study, enrichment possibility of apatite-bearing iron ore sample was investigated to obtain iron and phosphate concentrates, separately. It was determined that the raw iron ore contains 35.75% Fe and 5.36 P2O5. Magnetite from the ore can be enriched with low field strength wet magnetic separators, and apatite can be enriched from magnetite residues by flotation. For this purpose, the raw ore was ground to minus 106 m size and then subjected to magnetic separation and following flotation. According to experimental result, a magnetite concentrate containing 63.55% Fe and 0.65% P205, and a phosphate concentrates containing 25.33% P2O5 and 6.45%Fe were obtained. The results show that there are still difficulties in obtaining low iron-containing apatite concentrate. It is concluded that it is difficult to separate the iron and phosphorus minerals from each other, probably due to complex mineralogical composition and poor mineral liberation of the ore.

Keywords

• apatite
• magnetite
• magenetic separation
• flotation
• SEM-EDX

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