What Are The Influencing Factors Of Gold Flotation?

Gold is often associated with sulfide minerals such as copper and sulfur, and is often recovered by flotation process in beneficiation process. Gold minerals have good floatability. However, due to the characteristics of high density and high specific gravity, the flotation effect of gold ore is limited by many factors such as gold particle size, pH value of pulp, pulp concentration, slime and carbonaceous matter in gold ore.

1. Effect of gold particle size on flotation

For flotation operation, grinding size is one of the main adjustable factors. Usually, gold ore is recovered by carrier flotation, and the carrier mineral size can be separated by flotation by grinding operation. Due to the high density of gold ore, the flotation gold particle size is usually no more than 0.22mm, in order to facilitate flotation separation. If the ore contains large gold particles, gravity separation is required.

2. Effect of ph value of pulp flotation on flotation

In flotation operation, the pH value of pulp has an important effect on mineral floatability. In the suitable pulp pH value range, the performance of pharmaceutical collector and the recovery rate of gold ore will be improved. Gold ore can be separated by flotation in a wide range of pH. In actual production, with the increase of the dosage of pH regulator, the pH value of pulp increases, and the flotation recovery rate of the common gold carrier mineral pyrite increases. When pH is around 8, the recovery rate of pyrite begins to decline, so the pH value of pulp of general gold ore flotation ranges from 7 to 9.

3. Effect of pulp concentration on flotation of gold ore

Slurry concentration is very important to the efficiency of planktonic gold collection. At the same time, the high slurry concentration will also lead to the increase of slurry viscosity of gold mine, the difficulty of floating mineralized foam, and reduce the flotation rate of gold mine. Generally, for gold ores with fine particles below 38μm or coarse particles between 97~150μm, higher flotation concentration can achieve higher recovery while maintaining the flotation rate.

4. Effect of slime content on flotation of gold mine

Some gold deposits contain clay minerals, which tend to produce a large amount of slime in the grinding process. The properties of these slime are complex, the particle size is very fine, it is easy to absorb the flotation agents in the slurry, hinder the reaction of gold particles and flotation agents, resulting in the poor flotation effect of gold. To solve this problem, it is necessary to consider whether there are recoverable valuable elements in the slime, and separate the slime and pulp for different treatment through desliing treatment.

5. Effect of carbonaceous matter on flotation of gold ore

Some gold deposits contain carbonaceous materials. These carbonaceous substances have the ability to absorb gold minerals, and affect the reaction between gold particles and reagents, and then affect the floating. For these minerals, pretreatment can be used to reduce the influence of carbon on gold particles. Then, by adding carbon inhibitor, the carbonaceous matter reacts with the inhibitor first to reduce the consumption of gold collector. Therefore, the effect of collector and gold bearing substance can be increased to improve gold recovery.