Nickel is a kind of non-ferrous metal, which can form alloys, stainless steel, nickel-based alloys and other materials with many metal elements. When the nickel content exceeds 3%, it can be directly smelted and used for making various materials, but when it is lower than 3%, it needs to be sorted and purified through the mineral processing process and supporting mineral processing equipment before it can enter smelting.
What equipment is needed to build a nickel ore concentrator
According to the different components of nickel ore, the selected process methods are also different. The process flow can be divided into several stages: crushing and screening-grinding and classification-separation-tailings treatment. In this article, we will take you to understand the nickel ore mineral processing equipment for each process.
process stage 1 #:Nickel ore crushing and screening stage
The nickel ore crushing and screening stage can adopt a three-stage and one closed-circuit crushing and screening process. The raw ore is fed into the first stage of crushing from the feed bin, and then enters the second stage of crushing. After being crushed to a certain size, it is sent to the screening machine by the belt conveyor. The oversize returns to the second stage crusher, while the undersize enters the grinding link.
The main application equipment at this stage are: crusher, screening machine, belt conveyor and ore feeding bin.
- Crusher: Jaw crusher and cone crusher are the main types. Generally, the first stage of crushing is jaw crusher, and the second and third stages of crushing are cone crushers;
- Screening machine: circular vibrating screen and linear vibrating screen
process stage 2 #:Nickel ore grinding and classification stage
Grinding and screening can adopt two-stage closed-circuit grinding operation. The qualified materials after crushing are sent to the first-stage ball mill by the conveyor, and then go to the classification operation after grinding. Fine-grained classification is carried out, and qualified products after classification enter the sorting stage, while the overflow returns to the second-stage grinding to continue grinding.
The main application equipment in the grinding and grading stage are: grid ball mill, overflow ball mill, spiral classifier, hydrocyclone.
- Lattice ball mill: generally used in one-stage grinding for rough grinding
- Overflow ball mill: generally used in secondary grinding for fine grinding
- Spiral classifier: In the first-stage grinding operation, it cooperates with the grid ball mill for classification
- Hydrocyclone: In the second-stage grinding operation, it cooperates with the overflow ball mill to do the classification operation.
process stage 3 #:Nickel ore separation stage
There are two main types of nickel ore separation: flotation and gravity separation. Depending on the nature of the ore, the selected processes are different.
Nickel ore flotation
Flotation is mostly suitable for treating nickel sulfide ore containing silicate gangue or nickel minerals with uneven particle size. According to the different mineral properties, the commonly used flotation methods include preferential flotation and mixed flotation. craft.
Priority flotation: The process of floating copper to suppress nickel is adopted. The ground product is sent to the stirring tank, and the sulfide inhibitor and copper collector are added. After fully stirring, it is sucked into the flotation machine for flotation operation, and the foam product is flotation It is copper concentrate, and the tailings are nickel products, and the tailings need to enter the next flotation stage, and the nickel concentrate is obtained by flotation with the addition of sulfide ore collectors.
Mixed flotation: After grinding, the ore pulp enters the stirring tank, and after being fully mixed with the flotation agent, the mixed concentrate of copper and nickel is first floated out, and the mixed concentrate is sent to the ball mill for stage grinding, so that the two minerals can be dissociated in a single step After that, it enters the next stage of flotation. Before flotation, it is sent into the stirring tank, and the agent for inhibiting sulfidation and the agent for collecting copper are added to make it fully mixed, and the copper concentrate is floated out, while the tailings in the flotation tank The ore is nickel concentrate.
The main equipment used in the flotation stage are: flotation machines, stirring tanks, mineral processing agents, and lifting pumps.
- Flotation machine: XCF flotation machine, JJF flotation machine, KYF flotation machine, SF flotation machine, of which JJF flotation machine and SF flotation machine can form a combined unit, KYF flotation machine and XCF flotation machine Machines can form a joint unit;
- Stirring tank: There are mainly chemical stirring tank, high-efficiency stirring tank and conventional stirring tank;
- Mineral dressing agents: mainly nickel sulfide ore collectors and silicate ore inhibitors.
Nickel ore gravity separation
Nickel ore gravity separation generally adopts dense medium mineral processing method, which is suitable for processing iron-nickel-platinum type copper-nickel minerals. Using the density difference between gangue and nickel sulfide ore, the pulp is fed into the dense medium cyclone at a pressure of 0.05-0.20Mpa. For sorting, the low flow part is nickel sulfide ore, while the overflow is silicate gangue ore. The main application equipment of dense medium mineral processing is: dense medium cyclone.
In summary
The above is the nickel ore mineral processing and the type of mineral processing equipment used. In the actual mineral processingplant, which equipment to choose depends on the mineral processing. Therefore, it is necessary to pass the mineral processing test first and design a reasonable nickel ore mineral processing , and then customize reasonable mineral processing equipment in order to effectively improve the recovery rate of nickel ore and obtain an ideal return on investment.