Developments in ore sorting technologies have provided the ability to achieve economic dry pre-concentration of ores prior to a grinding/concentration circuit and, in some cases, produce a high grade concentrate of sufficient quality for end use. The use of dual X-ray transmission (XRT) sorting has been proven to provide efficient separations for materials such as coal at throughput capacities greater than 100 tph. A recently completed study evaluated the use of XRT sorting on anthracite coal with difficult cleaning characteristics at a mass flow rate of 120 tph. Excellent separation efficiencies were obtained on 60 x 10 mm material as indicated by probable error values less than 0.10. This publication will review the current status of ore sorting technologies and their applications along with a detailed presentation of the separation results obtained using XRT-based sorting.
R. Honaker 1 , M. Mahmoodabadi 1 and G. Luttrell 2 ;
1 Mining Engineering, University of Kentucky, Lexington, KY
2 Mining & Minerals Engineering, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA