Prediction of recovery of boron in terms of moisture and grade of run of mine ore

25th International Mining Congress of Turkey: New Trends in Mining, IMCET 2017 -- 11 April 2017 through 14 April 2017 -- -- 127813In this study, Tincal samples from Bandirma Boron Plant were taken for the period of October 2015. Tincal samples from the feed stream were collected for a one-month period on daily basis. A total number of 31 samples were analyzed in terms of moisture content and B2O3 grade. Moisture content and grade of the run of mine ore have an effect on the recovery of the boron processing plant. Concentrate grade was also determined at the same period where feed samples were collected and a correlation was tried to be established. Recovery of the plant was calculated each day as assuming the daily feed amount of Tincal as 500 tonnes (monthly 15000 tonnes) and daily product of 200 tonnes (monthly 6000 tonnes). Feed Tincal moisture contents vary between 2.77% and 5.54%. Although this range of moisture content is not a big deal, it might be related with increase or decrease in recovery percentages. B2O3 grade of the feed ore varied between 22.67 % and 27.25%. This approximately 5% range could be meaningfull, an increase in feed grade would also cause an increase in product B2O3 grade as expected. In this study, feed moisture and feed grade was correlated with recovery and a new method to predict recovery is proposed. According to this new method, recovery of B2O3 would be easily calculated by just employing the moisture content and grade data of run of mine ore. Very high correlation coefficient (R2=0.99) between measured and predicted recovery was achieved. This proposed method would enable one to better understand the effect of moisture content and tenor of run of mine ore on recovery