Assessment of iron ore concentration characteristics on the basis of ultrasonic measurements

A great number of various factors to a different extent impact iron ore treatment, properties of mineral composition of ore and parameters of technological equipment being some of them. To solve the problem of improving performance of a concentration plant in terms of the concentrate, it is required to elaborate effective scheduled procedures, upgrade technological equipment, develop methods of control over concentration processes considering technological properties of ore fed. There is suggested a method of improving efficiency of magnetic concentration of iron ore under the action of high-intensity ultrasound. There are established dependencies between physical-mechanical and chemical-mineralogical characteristics of iron ore slurry solids and their behavior in technological flows under controlled ultrasonic vibrations, this enabling simulation modelling of the process and specification of optimal controlling actions. The research object is assessment of characteristics and control of iron ore magnetic concentration on the technological line of the ore concentration plant. The research subject is the cyber-physical system based on using impacts of highintensity ultrasound on slurry solids to assess characteristics of iron ore magnetic concentration. Obtained dependencies and mathematical models of the non-linear spatial process of high-intensity ultrasound propagation in the iron ore slurry enable implementing the method of assessing characteristics of iron ore magnetic concentration and due to this increase efficiency of the mentioned operations. There are suggested methods of calculating intensity of high-intensity ultrasound in a certain point of the measurement area in order to perform forecast displacement of ground ore particles and changes of the fraction composition of slurry solids under the controlled action of high-intensity ultrasonic vibrations. The developed method and the software-engineering complex for its implementation enable restoring a function of distributing ground ore particles by sizes, forecasting results of technological operations and forming controlling actions.