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4 Liberation

This document discusses particle liberation and fracture, which are essential steps in mineral dressing and separation. Liberation refers to separating valuable and waste minerals, which is achieved through size reduction and detachment. Incomplete liberation limits the grade or recovery of an ore. Particle fracture is required for liberation and represents a major cost. Griffith's theory of fracturing explains that stresses concentrate at flaws in particles, and fracture occurs when the local strain energy at crack tips provides enough energy to create new surfaces.

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June Zamora
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102 views24 pages

4 Liberation

This document discusses particle liberation and fracture, which are essential steps in mineral dressing and separation. Liberation refers to separating valuable and waste minerals, which is achieved through size reduction and detachment. Incomplete liberation limits the grade or recovery of an ore. Particle fracture is required for liberation and represents a major cost. Griffith's theory of fracturing explains that stresses concentrate at flaws in particles, and fracture occurs when the local strain energy at crack tips provides enough energy to create new surfaces.

Uploaded by

June Zamora
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© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as PPT, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Comminution

Particle Fracture and Liberation


 Mineral
Dressing has long been
regarded to consist of two steps:
 Liberation

 Separation

 Separationis impracticable if the 1st


step has not been successfully
accomplished!
 Particles can consist of a
single mineral; called free
particles

When a particle consists of


2 or more minerals, this is
called locked particles
Liberation
 The essential prerequisite for the
separation of an ore into valuable and
waste fractions
 May be attained by 2 means:
 By size reduction
 By detachment
Fundamentally Important!

Incomplete liberation limits


either GRADE or RECOVERY!
Some definitions…

 Grains, Grain size


 Uncrushed rock

 Particles, Particle size


 Crushed rock
Degree of Liberation, f
 The percentage of a mineral or phase
occurring as free particles in relation to the
total of the minerals in the ore
 Conversely, the degree of locking is the
percentage of minerals that exist as locked
particles
Quantifying f
 Multiple separating tests
 Microscope counting
techniques
 Polarized light
mineragraphy
Two types of Liberation due to Fracture:

 Intergranular
 Happens when the interface between grains is
weak
 Fracture at the grain boundaries; liberation at
the mineral grain
 Transgranular
 Fracture occur across the grain; occurs when
mineral has weak structure
 Most common liberation problem
Liberation by Size Reduction
 To illustrate, consider the mineral below, a
10x10x10 cm cube block w/ cubic grains
of 10 mm/side
 Assuming the following:
 Such a mineral exists
 Crushing operation will yield a homogenously
sized product of 5mm / side cube
 The crystals w/in the rock is fast to each other
Liberation by Size Reduction

10 mm

Gangue
Free
Particles

5 mm
Locked Particles: Middlings
 Contains both valuable and gangue
minerals!
 A large proportion of the difficulties
experienced in mineral separation are
associated with the treatment of these
particles
Types of Middlings
For minerals of unequal abundance:
 The general behavior of the liberation is:
In general…
 The less abundant mineral or phase is not
freed at all unless the particles<grain size
 The more abundant mineral is easily freed
even at particles>grain size
 The more abundant mineral is always freer
than the less abundant one
Liberation by Detachment
 Occurs by preferential fracturing
 No further liberation may be obtained by
additional comminution
 Possible if mineral has:
 Macrostructural weakness (coal beds)
 Microstructural weakness (schists)
 Microstructural differences in physical properties of adjacent
minerals (galena and quartz)
MECHANISM OF
PARTICLE FRACTURE
Mechanism of Particle Fracture
 Liberation is practically a function of
particle fracture (inter- and trans-)
 This represents a MAJOR COST in any
MP operation!
Mechanism of Particle Fracture
 The breakage of the rock required to
achieve size reduction is ENERGY
INTENSIVE and the operation involved is
considered an ENERGY INEFFICIENT
OPERATION
 The efficiency of energy utilization during
fragmentation of solid particles is only 1%
wrt the new surfaces created!
Griffith’s Theory of Fracturing

 Basic Assumptions
 Single particle fracture
 Except for very small sizes, the ore
particle may be considered to be a
brittle material (the strain is proportional to the
applied stress up to the point of fracture)
Griffith’s Theory of Fracturing
 Observations
 Under stress, the presence of flaws in the
material lead to stress concentration in a solid
a l S tre sses
Extern

Crack
Stressed Bonds
Propagation

External Str
esses
Griffith’s Theory of Fracturing
 Observations
 Chemical bonds at the crack tip ranged from
unstressed to fully strained at the point of
breakage
 Virtually NO STRESS is required to bring about
bond breakage; stress is required to provide the
necessary energy to produce new surfaces!
 Fracture occurs when local strain energy at the
crack tip is just sufficient to provide surface
energy of the 2 new surfaces produced
Griffith’s Criteria of Fracture

2
G
Lcr
 Where
 G = Griffith Stress (critical applied tensile stress)
 ξ = Young’s Modulus
 γ = Surface free energy / unit area crack surface
 Lcr = crack length
Griffith’s Theory
 Requires that a tensile stress exists across
the crack to open it further!
 A uniform compression loading can only
close up the cracks
 A non-uniform compression loading leads
to localized tensile stresses

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