Investigation on the shear flocculation flotation behavior of micro fine
ilmenite and titanaugite
Guixia FAN,a* Jiongtian LIU, a,b Yijun CAO,b Hongxiang XU, c Peng LI, a
a
School of Chemical Engineering and Energy, Zhengzhou University, Zhengzhou 450001, China
National Engineering Research Center of Coal Preparation and Purification, Xuzhou 221116,
Jiangsu, China
c
School of Chemical and Environmental Engineering, University of Mining and Technology
(Beijing), Beijing, China, 100083.
Abstract: Shear flocculation characteristics of micro fine ilmenite and titanaugite were investigated
by minerals floatability tests, particle size analyses, light microscope measurements, turbidimetric
sedimentation tests and the calculation of interaction between particles. Results show the micro
fine ilmenite and titanaugite floatability can be improved under optimum stirring intensity and
stirring time. With the hydrophobicity of particles increase, stirring intensity has a lower effect to
shear flocculation. Under the certain conditions, the apparent size of flocs increased with the stirring
intensity increased. By the morphological structure of minerals flocs in different stirring intensity,
the open branch chain structure is observed from titanaugite flocs. However, more density and the
closed branch chain structure are acquired from ilmenite flocs. Shear flocculation power is
consistent with minerals floatability by turbidimetric sedimentation tests. The calculation of
interaction between particles shows the flocculation behaviors can be occurred easily in two
particles.
Key words: ilmenit; titanaugite; shear flocculation; stirring; size distributions; interaction
b
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