Primary grind and rougher recovery relationship of southwest deposit of Oyu Tolgoi ore: Phase 4B high-grade gold
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Date
2022-05-26
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German Mongolian Institute for Resouce and Technology
Abstract
The objective of this study was to investigate the effect of different primary grind sizes for the Cu (copper) and Fe (iron) recovery of the Phase 4B high-grade gold ore, which is from the
southwestern deposit of the Oyu Tolgoi deposit. A series of nine rougher flotation tests have been completed to assess the primary grind size at the Mineral Processing laboratory of
German-Mongolian Institute for Resources and Technology. Three sizes, which are a P80 of 54 µm, 106 µm and 212 µm were chosen for testing the relationship between P80 particle size and rougher recovery under same condition. In this Bachelor thesis, the relationship between primary grind and rougher recovery of ore from the southwestern deposit of Oyu Tolgoi ore was investigated, which is the high-grade gold ore of Phase 4B. The Southwest deposit is in the gold-rich porphyry category and is an ore body approximately 250 meters in diameter and more than 700 meters in vertical extent. Main ore minerals are chalcopyrite and bornite. The
Oyu Tolgoi concentrator plant’s strategy for processing the ore is to operate at lower pH to maximize gold recovery in the froth flotation. Furthermore, the copper grade in the final
concentrate depends on the P80 particle size. Hence, it is important whether the current P80 particle size of the phase 4B high-grade gold ore is optimal. With the exception of Au, the
various p80 effects for the Cu and Fe recovery of the high-quality ore of the phase 4B highgrade gold ore are only determined. Because the gold (Au) mineral has a detection limit of
around 100 ppm on the Thermo Scientific Niton XL2 XRF Analyzer, which was employed in the study's X-ray fluorescence quantitative elemental analysis. Furthermore, the phase 4B highgrade gold ore has 0.44 ppm of Au according to the Oyu Tolgoi test work of "Head assay" experiments of the Oyu Tolgoi deposit at the Mineral Processing laboratory of GMIT in August, 2021, where I worked as an intern. So, the effects of different primary grind sizes on Fe recovery of the Phase 4B high-grade gold ore are also being investigated due to the detection limit of Au, gold on the Thermo Scientific Niton XL2 XRF analyzer.