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Copper-nickel ore or nickel oxide ore with pyrite and other gangue
Flotation is the mostly used method for the beneficiation of copper-nickel sulfide ores. Magnetic separation and gravity separation are usually assistant beneficiation methods. Collectors and foamers are often used for flotation of copper sulfide ores. The basic principle for determining flotation process is that copper can enter nickel concentrate rather than nickel enters into copper concentrate. Because the nickel in the copper concentrate is lost greatly in the smelting process, and the copper in the nickel concentrate can be recovered completely. The flotation of copper-nickel ores has four basic processes as follows.
1) Direct priority flotation or partial priority flotation process: when copper content in ore is much higher than nickel content, this process can be used to separate copper into a separate concentrate. The advantage of this process is that the copper concentrate with lower nickel content can be obtained directly.
2) Mixed flotation process: Used to separate ore containing less copper than nickel, the obtained copper-nickel mixed concentrate is directly smelted into high nickel matte.
3) Mixing-Priority flotation process: mix flotation of copper and nickel from ores, then separate copper concentrate with low nickel and nickel concentrate with low copper from mixed concentrate. The nickel concentrate was smelted to obtain high nickel matte.
4) Mixing-preferential flotation and recovering part of nickel from tailings of mixed flotation: When the flotability of various nickel minerals in ores is very different, the nickel-bearing minerals with poor flotability can be further recovered from tailings after copper-nickel mixed flotation.
