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By H. B. Charmbury, D. R. Mitchell

Everyone in the coal industry from top management to the preparation engineer is vitally interterested in recovering as much salable coal as possible from the run-of-mine product. Coal losses from a preparation plant occur in the solid refuse material being discharged from the plant and in the bleed-off slurry from the water circuit. The refuse is generally hauled from the plant in solid form by trucks, conveyors, or aerial trams to the refuse or culm banks or it may be crushed and transported by hydraulic methods to refuse ponds or dams. The loss of coal in refuse material and the extent of this problem has been covered in another paver.' The loss of salable coal in the plant bleed-off slurry is one of the water circuit problems in coal preparation plants. Slurries originate at various places in the processing circuits and are usually disposed of by transportation to waste ponds known as slurry ponds. Even though the combustible material discharged as slurry and refuse from the plant is labeled a loss, the loss must only be considered temporary. There is a tendency at the present time to examine refuse and slurry losses and to reprocess these materials to recover valuable coal. Slurries from eight bituminous coal preparation plants in central and western Pennsylvania have been sampled and examined to determine the amount of recoverable coal in each. Examinations of the samples were made to determine the tons per hour of solids and the gallons per minute of water in the slurry; the size, ash, and sulfur analyses of the solids; and the sink-float characteristics of the larger solids. The extreme fines (—325 mesh material) from one of the samples has been examined further to determine the micron size fractions as well as the ash and sulfur content of the micron sizes. Collection of the Samples: Field trips were made to each of the plants where samples were obtained and discussions held with the preparation engineer prior to sampling. The flowsheet of the plant operation was studied and a time-period selected to obtain a representative sample. At least 20 1-gal samples of total plant bleed-off suspensions were collected at each plant in increments over designated periods belived to be typical of the plant flow Three of the samples were obtained from plants in the Pittsburgh area. Each plant supplied information on the capacity, operating time, type of cleaning equipment used, water and material balances, and auxiliary equipment. From the time required to collect given amounts of slurry and from the amount of solids in the slurry, total solids discharges from the plant were calculated and compared with the plant flow. Ash and sulfur analyses of the total solids were also checked, at some plants, with company figures. In all cases where checks could be made there was reasonable agreement between company figures and those reported here. Analysis of the Slurries: Representative fractions of properly agitated samples were examined in the laboratory to determine the specific gravities of the slurries. The solids and water were separated by filtration to check the weight of each so that the percent of solids in the pulp could be determined. From the resulting data, presented in Table I, it may be seen that the percent solids in the slurries ranges from 2.8 to 39.0 and the amount of solids from 2.61 to 45.61 tph. Size Analysis of Solids: Representative fractions of the slurries were permitted to settle and the clear water was removed by siphoning. The solids were then wet-screened at 28, 35, 48, 65, 100, 150, 200 and 325 mesh. Results of the size analyses are presented in Table 11. These results indicate the extreme variation of sizes and in most cases the degree of fineness of the solids. The amount of —325 mesh ranges from 22.5 to 84.5 pct and the amount of+200 mesh from 8.3 to 69.1 pct.

Jan 1, 1961

By R. J. Wensley

THE use of small substations for the supplying of 275-volt energy to the locomotive and cutting machines in coal mines is a well-established practice. A few years ago, when labor costs were lower, these substations were located as near to the load as possible, and an operator was provided for each station. This practice has now become so expensive that substations are being located with reference to other mining machinery, such as hoists or pumps, so that one operator can look after both. Some-times the substation is operated by one whose duties make him traverse quite a large area. In such cases the interruption of alternating-current supply may produce a long interruption in the direct current, as the station cannot resume service until this man reaches it. Such interruptions interfere seriously with production and may easily counterbalance the supposed saving gained by such operating methods. The grouping of substations for convenience in operating may also result in excessive copper loss and consequently poor trolley voltage, with its attendant evils of low locomotive speeds and increased locomotive motor maintenance. The speed of the coal-cutting machines will also be reduced. By relieving the substation of its, burden of the operating labor cost, the most economical location, from an electrical standpoint, may be chosen. The matter of machine insurance should also be considered. If an attendant is caring for several kinds of equipment, he cannot watch the machine continually for signs of trouble; therefore, continued overload, phase failure, low alternating-current voltage, bearing trouble, etc. may result. Some partly automatic equipments have been installed; these have protection against low voltage, reverse current, and bearing trouble and are provided with automatic reclosing circuit breakers. This is a step in the right direction but it does not go far enough to give first-class machine insurance.

Jan 9, 1921

Beyer Barometric Condenser The Ingersoll-Rand Co. is now offering to the trade complete steam­condensing plants for all service conditions. This equipment includes the Beyer barometric condenser, for' which the company has secured the patent rights, Imperial duplex and Ingersoll-Rogler straight-line reciprocating dry vacuum pumps and, where required, Cameron simplex and centrifugal pumps. The Beyer barometric condenser is of the counter-current type, in which air and cooling water flow in opposite directions. The steam inlet is at the bottom of the condensing v el, the water inlet above and the air-removal opening at the top. The sheets of cooling water over owing the pool at the inlet point meet the entering steam. The two are brought into intimate contact by conical baffle plates which assist the water to absorb to its full capacity the latent heat of the steam. The non-condensable air liberated in the condensing action rises through the falling water to the removal point at the top, being cooled to practically the temperature of the incoming water. It is also to be noted that ample opportunity is given for the removal of the air content of the water before

Jan 8, 1916

By M. ROWE, H. E. Gilliland, L. BARNES

The authors of this paper are to be commended for a clear exposition of a timely subject. However, some important conclusions, in addition to those presented in the paper, can be drawn from the results of their elaborate and rather complete numerical computations. First of all, the major part of the calculations presented in the paper are for semi-infinite slabs of oil shale (the authors designate this as Model I) and a question must be posed — Are these elaborate computations needed to arrive at realistic estimates of the shale oil displaced. Consider the model of Lauwerier* that corresponds to the authors Model I if thermal conduction parallel to the fracture be neglected. If one also neglects the finite (but relatively small) heat capacity of the material in the fracture, it is easily shown from Lauwerier's solution that the cumulative oil production would be:

Jan 1, 1969

By M. Felsenthal

Engineers are frequently faced with the problem of having to predict oil recovery from a solution gas drive reservoir in the early life of a field. This is often the time when actual laboratory or field-derived gas-oil permeability (kg/k0) data are not yet available. Although excellent collections of k0/k0 data for various types of rocks may be found in the literature,1,2,3 a need exists for a more detailed correlation of k0/k0 data with core properties such as porosity, permeability, clay content or pore-size distribution. It is the purpose of this article to present this type of correlation for sandstone material. The correlation is based on laboratory tests performed on over 300 core samples from 19 reservoirs in the United States and Canada. EXPERIMENTAL Cores were analyzed by routine procedures, using samples of conventional size (7/8-in. diameter, 7/8-in long) cut parallel to the bedding planes. Air permeability was measured at 1.67 atm mean pressure in a Hassler-type apparatus. Porosity was determined with the aid of a Ruska bulk volume meter and a Boyle's Law rock volume meter, An evaporation method' was used to evaluate irreducible water saturations. Core samples were saturated with 25,000 ppm NaCl brine. The brine was reduced to the irreducible saturation, and the remainder of the pore space was filled with kerosene. This was followed by multiphase flow tests using the so-called "dispersed feed" technique.5 n this technique, gas and oil (kerosene and kerosene-saturated air) were dispersed with the aid of a porous Alun-durn feed head, the face of which contained a waffle-shaped system of Lucite-lined grooves. Oil entered the back side of the feed head and emerged at the raised areas of the front face. Gas was introduced directly into the system of grooves at the front face. The gas-oil mixture then entered the test core which was kept in capillary contact with the feed head. Permeabilities were determined from rate and pressure measurements and saturations from weights. All determinations were performed at equilibrium or steady-state conditions. Pore-size distributions were determined on selected samples by a mercury injection technique.6 GENERAL CORRELATIVE TRENDS When examining data from a given reservoir, it was noted that k0/k0 vs saturation curves became generally less steep as specific air permeability increased, a development that has a favorable effect on oil displacement efficiency by solution gas drive. This trend has also been reported by others in the literature.' An effect of porosity on k0/k0 data was also noted. This effect was not generally discernible in a study of relative permeability data for a given reservoir but became apparent when data for sandstone reservoirs of similar lithology but differing average porosity were compared. For instance, in a comparison of argillaceous and/or calcareous sandstones from 11 reservoirs ranging in average porosities from 14 to 28 per cent, a definite trend was noted, indicating that for a given permeability k0/k0 curves became less favorable (i.e., steeper) as porosity increased. A similar trend was observed for a group of comparatively clean sandstones from five reservoirs ranging in average porosities from 15 to 21 per cent. For a given permeability and porosity, comparatively clean sandstones gave more favorable k0/k0 curves than argillaceous and/or calcareous sandstone or chert reservoirs. The laboratory studies also showed that least favorable k0/k0 curves were exhibited by shaly sandstone, conglomerate, and sandstone containing carbon inclusions. Table 1 lists the various source reservoirs classified by lithology types. To facilitate a correlation of k0/k0 data with core characteristcis, it was found expedient to work with

By AIME AIME

THE Board of Directors of the Institute has authorized the appointment of a committee to draw up rules of procedure under which awards can be made from time to time to petroleum engineers for outstanding contributions to the art of finding and producing oil and gas. These awards will 11e sponsored by the Petroleum Division and are the first recognition by any professional society of outstanding achievement in "oil mining." They will be in the form of either a gold medal, scholar- ship, or other suitable prize. The awards will be financed from the income of the Anthony F. Lucas Memorial Fund, which was started about fifteen years ago, shortly after' his death, by admirers of Captain Lucas.

Jan 1, 1936

L50 Adirondack L1 Alaska L2 Arizona L58 Arkansas L66 Billings Petroleum L3 Black Hills L4 Boston L5 Carlsbad Potash L6 Central Appalachian L60 Central New Mexico L7 Chicago L8 Cleveland L9 Colorado L57 Colorado Plateau L10 Columbia LII Connecticut L55 Dallas L12 Delta L65 Denver Petroleum L13 Detroit L14 East Texas L15 El Paso Metals L71 Evangeline L45 Florida L54 Fort Worth L16 Gulf Coast L61 Hobbs L62 Hugoton L68 Illinois Pet Basin L17 Kansas L18 Lehigh Valley L52 Lou-Ark L47 Mexico L19 Mid-Continent L20 Minnesota L56 Mississippi L21 Montana L22 Nevada L64 Niagara Frontier L23 New York L67 New York Petroleum L25 North Pacific L24 North Texas L26 Ohio Valley L27 Oklahoma City L28 Oregon L63 Panhandle L29 Penn -Anthracite L30 Permian Basin L51 Peru L31 Philadelphia L32 Pittsburgh L33 St Louis L34 San Francisco L59 San Joaquin L35 Southeast L36 Southern Calif L69 Southern Calif Pet L53 South Plains L37 Southwest Texas L48 Southwest Alaska L38 Southwest N Mex L44 Spindletop L39 Tri-State L40 Upper Peninsula L41 Utah L70 Venezuela L42 Washington, D C L43 Wyoming L49 West Central Texas L46 Philippine

Jan 1, 1956

By Jean A. Andre

In 1969 "Société des Mines et Fonderies de Zinc de la Vieille-Montagne" produced 221,000 tons zinc ingots and 22,000 tons zinc dust, thus rating highest on the world's zinc producer list. The Company's plant at Balen, Belgium, with an output of 135,000 tons electrolytic zinc is the most important one of this group; it is an integrated metallurgical zinc and lead unit with recovery of most by-products. The present paper describes the zinc production facilities. The roasting section includes four fluid bed roasters (total concentrates charged: 740 tpd) and two sulfuric acid having a corresponding capacity. Calcine is leached in a fully automated plant by a two-step continuous process. Leaching residues, mixed with lead furnace slag, are treated in a shaft furnace. The recovered zinc fume is leached separately. In the near future, the leaching residues are to be treated by a wet process, developed in the Company's own laboratories. Purification of solutions is accomplished in two steps: antimony and zinc dust are added in the first one, only zinc dust in the second one for removal of cadmium. Electrolysis cells are partly of a conventional type. A new type of cell configuration was put onstream in October, 1969, planned output 60,000 tpy. Main features of the new cell rooms are the fully automatic pulling, stripping and replacing of the jumbo-size cathodes (immersed area 2.6 m2). Zinc cathodes are remelted in induction furnaces followed by in-line automatic casting and stacking machines.

Jan 1, 1970

By Edward Capillon

THE problem of scrap is probably of greater importance inn the production of gold, silver and other precious metal alloys than is the case for base metals and alloys. Remelting of gold and silver scrap in the shop is always a costly process because it involves losses by oxidation of the base metals in the alloy with a consequent increase in the percentage of precious metal. This is most marked in the case of alloys containing the low-boiling and easily oxidized metals zinc and cadmium. Since it is. not generally feasible to assay every shop remelt it follows that the possibilities of lost values are large. So-called rolled gold and silver plate is made by soldering or welding the precious metal alloys onto base, metal. Such plate when defective must be sent to the refinery to recover the gold and silver values, thereby involving additional expense in the form of refining charges. It is obvious therefore that gold and silver alloy scrap is an important item in manufacturing cost and must be reduced to a minimum. The amount of scrap resulting from poor metal will depend on a number of factors in the manufacturing operations, not least among which is the melting and casting practice. The notes which follow are a summary of experiments performed at various times to determine what variables in melting and casting are influential in the production of sound alloys.

Jan 1, 1930

By Charles T. Baroch, Charles J. Baroch

In 20 years of commercial development, nuclear reactors have demonstrated that they are a safe, dependable, and economical source of power. Operating experience with commercial power reactors has firmly established nuclear power as a practicable source of energy. For both boiling-water (BWR) and pressurized-water (PWR) reactors, performances to date have generally met design predictions. Furthermore, it has become possible to analyze and understand the nuclear, chemical, and physical behavior of this class of reactors. The United Kingdom has had similar success with gas-cooled reactors. The Experimental Boiling Water Reactor (EBWR), the first United States experimental power reactor, began operation in 1956. It proved to be capable of supplying 4500 kw (kilowatts) of power. This reactor was followed in 1957 by the Pressurized Water Reactor at Shippingport, Pa. It was the nation's first full-scale central-station nuclear power plant and the first in the world designed exclusively for the production of civilian electric power. The Shippingport reactor was originally designed to produce 60 megawatts (MW) of electricity, and it was increased to 100 MW in 1964. In 12 years of operation, this reactor generated over 4.5-million MW-hr of electricity in spite of many shutdowns for experimental alterations. By 1969, a total of 15 central-station nuclear power reactors were operable in the United States with an aggregate electrical capacity of over 4200 MW. Early in 1964, Jersey Central Power & Light Co. announced plans for constructing a 515-MW nuclear plant at Oyster Creek, N.J., to be built without government financial assistance. The company stated that a nuclear plant had been selected competitively with fossil fuel. Their economic analysis stated that the plant would generate electricity at less than 4 mills per kw-hr, competitive with coal at 200 per million Btu (British thermal units). Coal cost in 1964 for that region averaged 26.00 per million Btu. The Jersey Central report created wide interest in public-utility circles; nevertheless, no other nuclear plants were announced in 1964. However, in 1965, six nuclear plants were announced by utilities, followed by 26 in 1966, 29 in 1967, and 10 in 1968. By Sept. 30, 1969, 97 reactors were operable, being built, or planned. The cost of these, all committed by electric utilities, was estimated at about $12 billion. When constructed, they will have an electrical capacity of 72,000 MW. The unprecedented surge in power reactors that started in 1965 tapered in 1968, and only seven reactors were announced in

Jan 1, 1976

By Bradley Stoughton

AT THE meeting of the Board of Directors on May 20, the resignation of Bradley Stoughton as Secretary of the Institute was presented and regretfully accepted by the Board. The letter of resignation follows : Gentlemen: About two years ago, I indicated to the President and some members of the Board my belief that the office of Secretary of the Institute should not be a permanent one. It is my observation of events, not only in our own Institute, but also in several sister societies, that too long a tenure of office by the Secretary inevitably leads to a situation which is not good either for him or for the society. After submitting this in writing to the Directors on February 17, 1920, I was overpersuaded by members of the Board to defer resignation until a more convenient time for the

Jan 1, 1921

By Ralph H. Sweetser

MUCH progress in -blast-furnace construction and in the manufacture of firebrick for furnace linings has been made since the publication of Bulletin 130 of the U. S. Bureau of Mines on "Blast-Furnace Breakouts, Explosions and Slips, and Methods of Prevention," by F. H. Willcox in 1917. At the time of publishing this report comparatively little information was available to blast-furnace men as to the fundamental facts relating to the character of blast-furnace refractories. Some of the accepted theories of only a few years ago have been completely reversed. The mortality of blast-furnace linings used to be so great that nearly every furnace plant had one or more complete linings in the brick shed ready for use in case of a lining suddenly "going out"; it was generally accepted that a furnace could not "keep her lines" more than two or three years at best, and often a hot spot in the shell would develop, or a breakout occur in the hearth or bosh within a year or two after blowing in on a new lining. In some respects these frequent relinings were not so detrimental as to he a complete loss because they afforded opportunities to take advantage of advances in blast-furnace practice. At present the cost of relining has greatly increased, but the life of a lining has also increased. Anything less than five years on a lining is now considered a short blast.

Jan 1, 1932

By H. Conrad

The strain hardening associated with the creep of magnesium single crystals at room temperatu.Je was investigated by shear tests in which the direction of stressing was reversed a number of times after creep in a <100> direction. The strain hardening was strongly anisotropic; the largest amount occurring in the direction of flow and the least 180 deg to this. The time law for creep changed from a parabolic type to logarithmic for the first and subsequent reversals of stress. For a given stress the creep strain decreased significantly for the first and second reversals and then only slightly for subsequent reversals. The logarithmic creep constant a changed in a similar manner. A linear relationship was observed between the creep strain for a given reversal and the stress. The slope for the third reversal yielded a strain hardening coefficient 12 to 16 times greater than that observed for unidirectional flow. Al-though no recovery was observed upon resting at room temperature, the hardening resulting from stress reversals could be completely removed by heating to 450" C. PREVIOUS work1.&apos; indicated that the creep rate of magnesium single crystals tested in the temperature range of 78" to 364°K decreased with time. This was attributed to an increase in internal stress resulting from an accumulation of dislocations at internal obstacles. The object of the present investigation was to further evaluate the nature of this hardening by conducting tests in which the direction of stressing is changed after previous creep in shear in a given slip direction. Previous to 1950 three investigations indicated that a Bauschinger effect3 occurred for single crystals as well as polycrystals brass in tension compression,

Jan 1, 1960

By L. J. Health

Synthetic rock with predictable porosity and permeability has been Prepared from mixtures of sand, cement and water. Three series of mixes were investigated primarily for the relation between porosity and permeability for certain grain sizes and proportions. Synthetic rock prepared of 65 per cent large grains, 27 per cent small grains and 8 per cent Portland cement, gave measurable results ranging in porosity from 22.5 to 40 per cent and in permeability from 0.1 darcies to 6 darcies. This variation in porosity and permeability was caused by varying the amount of blending water. Drainage-cycle relative permeability characteristics of the synthetic rock were similar to those of natural reservoir rock. INTRODUCTION The fundamental behavior characteristics of fluids flowing through porous media have been described in the literature. Practical application of these flow characteristics to field conditions is too complicated except where assumptions are overly simplified. The use of dimensionally scaled models to simulate oil reservoirs has been described in the literature. 1-3 These and other papers have presented the theoretical and experimental justification for model design. Others have presented elements of model construction and their operation. In most investigations the porous media have consisted of either u ncon soli da ted sand, glass beads, broken glass or plastic-impregnated granular substances—materials in which the flow behavior is not identical to that in natural reservoir rock. The relative permeability curves for unconsoli-dated sands differ from those for consolidated sandstone. The effect of saturation history on relative permeability measurements is discussed by Geffen, et a1.4 Wyga15 has shown quite conclusively that a process of artificial cementation can be used to render un consolidated packs into synthetic sandstones having properties similar to those of natural rock. Many theoretical and experimental studies have been made in attempts to determine the structure and properties of unconsolidated sand, the most notable being by Naar and Wygal.6 Others have theorized and experimented with the fundamental characteristics of reservoir rocks. This study was conducted to determine if some general relationship could be established between the size of sand grains and the porosity and permeability in consolidated binary packs. This paper presents the results obtained by changing some of the factors which affect the porosity and permeability of synthetically prepared sandstone. In addition, drainage relative permeability curves are presented. EXPERIMENTAL PROCEDURE Mixtures of Portland cement with water and aggregate generally are designed to have certain characteristics, but essentially all are planned to be impervious to water or other liquids. Synthetic sandstone simulating oil reservoir rock, however, must be designed to have a given permeability (sometimes several darcies), a porosity which is primarily the effective porosity but quantitatively similar to natural rock, and other characteristics comparable to reservoir rock, such as wettability, pore geometry, tortuosity, etc. Unconsolidated ternary mixtures of spheres gave both a theoretically computed and an experimentally observed minimum porosity of about 25 per cent.7 By using a particle-distribution system, one-size particle packs had reproducible porosities in the reproducible range of 35 to 37 per cent.6 For model reservoir studies of the prototype system, a synthetic rock having a porosity of 25 per cent or less and a permeability of 2 darcies was required. The rock had to be uniform and competent enough to handle. Synthetic sandstone cores were prepared utilizing the technique developed by Wygal.5 Some slight variations in the procedure were incorporated. The sand was sieved through U. S. Standard sieves. A 18-20 sand denotes that the sand passed the Number

Jan 1, 1966

By Ernst M. Cohn

The demonstrations of the "Silent Sentry" by Union Carbide Corp. in 1957 and of a special tractor-plow by Allis-Chalmers in 1959 ushered in the technology era of fuel cells. The idea for direct conversion of chemical to electrical energy, first published in 1801 by Davy in England and Ritter in Germany, has been kept alive by a few people through 150 years: Grove built the first hydrogen-oxygen fuel cell in 1839; Mond and Langer made electrolyte contributions around 1890 that are still used today; Baur worked on coal-based cells from 1900; Bacon started his work in the &apos;30&apos;s, which resulted in the first multi-kilowatt unit in the &apos;50&apos;s; Davtyan studied molten-salt electrolytes in the &apos;40&apos;s, followed by Ketelaar in the &apos;50&apos;s; and Justi developed highly active electrodes in the &apos;50&apos;s, to name only some of the pioneers. Despite the tremendous increase in research and development of fuel cells, these direct energy converters are still in their infancy. They will find their functional application in space, where power density must be maximized and product water utilized. These early systems will provide valuable experience in system engineering and reliability.

Jan 9, 1964

By Bedrand L. Johnson

THE phosphate-rock industry is built upon natural deposits of rocks and minerals in which the element phosphorus is present as a phoshate. The term ?phosphate rock? is a general one, applied to certain rocks of different degrees of consolidation and of diverese origin, charater and occurrence, composed of intimate mixtures of several phosphate minerals, largely submicrocrystalline, usually calcium phosphates, in commerical quantities, with various impurities. This term includes phosphatized limestones, sandstone, shales, and igneous rocks; nodular phosphates ; residual weathered phosphatic limestones ; vein phosphates ; and phosphatic sediments, both consolidated and unconsolidated.

Jan 1, 1944

By WALTER VOIGTLANDER

FOR nearly 100 years wire rope has been fabricated in much the same way. To the great majority of mine superintendents wire rope is just wire rope, little or no semblance of individuality or identifying characteristics. Such an impression was fairly justified until three or four years ago when a practical means was found of performing or preshaping the wires and strands. This discovery permitted a revolutionary change in wire rope manufacture. Instead of merely twisting a number of wires into a strand, then twisting several strands into a complete rope (which twisting would naturally result in great internal strain, thus reducing the resiliency and over-all efficiency of the completed rope), the preformed wires and strands were laid in place without force or twisting. The obvious result was a rope more nearly approximating mechanical perfection. The applied loads are more evenly distributed throughout the component wires and strands, thus reducing unbalanced wire stresses. This results in a higher safety factor. The fact that preformed rope will not unravel when untied at the ends proves the absence of a torsional stress that exists in ordinary rope. A greater useful allowable stress in the wires is therefore possible in actual operating service.

Jan 1, 1926

By K. L. Sutherland, J. Rogers

The relationships between collector and mineral, activator and mineral, and activator, collector and mineral will be considered herein. We propose to criticize current theories of flotation but we will not repeat the many pertinent arguments presented by Wark and Cox28 in 1937 in which the "chemical" or more strictly the "solubility" theory proposed by Taggart and co-workers22 is shown to be untenable. Recently Taggart, Arbiter and Kellogg24 have studied the long-chain aliphatic amines as collectors and have attempted to resuscitate the solubility theory for these particular collectors. Dean and Ambrose3 have felt that "we stumble over words" when we distinguish different mechanisms of adsorption. Our view is that nothing is more stultifying to the development of a science than attempts to force widely different phenomena into one classification. This oversimplification leads immediately to difficulties in the interpretation of results. Experimental Procedure The response of minerals to activator and collector was determined by "captive-bubble" tests. The methods of preparation of specimens26 and of testingin have been previously described. Results from captive-bubble tests were confirmed by flotation tests in glass-stoppered cylinders.26 The full lines shown in the figures relating solution composition to contact (flotation) distinguish solutions in which contact (flotation) is possible from those in which it is not. The curve is derived by successive approximation and the accuracy is ±o.2 pH units and ±5 mg. per liter of collector or depressant. Solution compositions for which it was shown experimentally that contact or flotation is possible are marked by a circle, those for which it is not possible by a cross and those for which it is doubtful by a cross within a circle. It is assumed that at all other solution compositions within (without) the curve, contact or flotation is possible (not possible). After testing in the collector solution, the mineral was removed, washed, and tested by the captive-bubble method in water, or floated in a cylinder with frother only. In this way the composition of solutions in which a mineral was conditioned but in which properties of the collector solution prevented contact or flotation can be defined. The composition of solutions in which conditioning was possible lie between the full and broken curve, the experimental results being indicated on the figures by a square. The curves show the limits of composition of solution in which flotation in a cell would be possible. Many factors other than those considered in these tests determine recovery or grade of a given mineral in practice.

Jan 1, 1947

By J. Rogers, K. L. Sutherland

The relationships between collector and mineral, activator and mineral, and activator, collector and mineral will be considered herein. We propose to criticize current theories of flotation but we will not repeat the many pertinent arguments presented by Wark and Cox28 in 1937 in which the "chemical" or more strictly the "solubility" theory proposed by Taggart and co-workers22 is shown to be untenable. Recently Taggart, Arbiter and Kellogg24 have studied the long-chain aliphatic amines as collectors and have attempted to resuscitate the solubility theory for these particular collectors. Dean and Ambrose3 have felt that "we stumble over words" when we distinguish different mechanisms of adsorption. Our view is that nothing is more stultifying to the development of a science than attempts to force widely different phenomena into one classification. This oversimplification leads immediately to difficulties in the interpretation of results. Experimental Procedure The response of minerals to activator and collector was determined by "captive-bubble" tests. The methods of preparation of specimens26 and of testingin have been previously described. Results from captive-bubble tests were confirmed by flotation tests in glass-stoppered cylinders.26 The full lines shown in the figures relating solution composition to contact (flotation) distinguish solutions in which contact (flotation) is possible from those in which it is not. The curve is derived by successive approximation and the accuracy is ±o.2 pH units and ±5 mg. per liter of collector or depressant. Solution compositions for which it was shown experimentally that contact or flotation is possible are marked by a circle, those for which it is not possible by a cross and those for which it is doubtful by a cross within a circle. It is assumed that at all other solution compositions within (without) the curve, contact or flotation is possible (not possible). After testing in the collector solution, the mineral was removed, washed, and tested by the captive-bubble method in water, or floated in a cylinder with frother only. In this way the composition of solutions in which a mineral was conditioned but in which properties of the collector solution prevented contact or flotation can be defined. The composition of solutions in which conditioning was possible lie between the full and broken curve, the experimental results being indicated on the figures by a square. The curves show the limits of composition of solution in which flotation in a cell would be possible. Many factors other than those considered in these tests determine recovery or grade of a given mineral in practice.

Jan 1, 1947

Jan 1, 1961