International Journal of Mechanical Engineering and Technology (IJMET), ISSN 0976 6340(Print),

ISSN 0976 6359(Online), Volume 5, Issue 5, May (2014), pp. 83-90 IAEME
83











AN APPROACH FOR ENERGY CONSERVATION ON PARTIALLY
LATERISED KHONDALITE ROCKS USING THERMAL SHOCK
TREATMENT


1
Ranjita Swain,
2
R. BhimaRao

1
C V Raman College of Engineering and
2
Aryan Institute of Engineering and Technology, Bhubaneswar, Odisha, India


ABSTRACT

Partially Lateritised Khondalite (PLK) rocks are the bauxite mining waste materials
generated during mining and dumped at the mining site, create environmental pollution. These waste
rocks can be utilized as filler materials for different industrial applications after grinding to suitable
mesh size. Thermal shock treatment on ore is used for grain boundary breakage and size reduction,
due to thermal shock treatment the surface adsorbed gangue minerals also releases and expose new
surface area in the ore. Comminution study is used after this treatment for further reduction in size.
In comminution study, ball mill has good selective grinding performance. This paper deals with the
effect of thermal shock treatment on grinding characteristics of PLK rock and the overall energy
savings achieved. Alumina based filler/ceramic materials were used in different industries. Thermal
shock of the samples was evaluated using water quench test. Surface deterioration level of samples
was monitored by image analysis before and after quenching. A total energy saving of the order of
52.8 % could be achieved when a sample preheated at 1123 K for 60 minutes followed by coldwater
quenching and grinding.

Keywords: Energy Saving, Grinding, PLK Rock, Thermal Shock Treatment, Work Index.

1. INTRODUCTION

In order to produce about 2.1 million tons of alumina per year by National Aluminium
Company, about 6.3 million tons per annum of bauxite is being mined. While mining of this bauxite
per annum, an equal amount of partially laterized khondalite (PLK) rocks associated with kaolinised
khondalite rocks are also being generated and dumped at the mine site as waste material or
sometimes used for back filling of abandoned mines. The PLK rocks are associated with different
characteristics such as brittle, loose, semi compact, abrasive etc. type of rocks or materials and hence
the crushing characteristics of the rock may vary. This waste can be utilized as a filler material in the
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International Journal of Mechanical Engineering and Technology (IJMET), ISSN 0976 6340(Print),
ISSN 0976 6359(Online), Volume 5, Issue 5, May (2014), pp. 83-90 IAEME
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industries like paint, pigment, rubber, cement, paper, ceramic and pharmaceutical etc. These filler
industries need very fine and some industries also need white fine ground materials. Hence,
comminution studies are essential to prepare the bulk rock to very fine grained material.
Comminution processes are enormous energy consumption processes. The loss of grinding
media through wear is also a significant cost in any mineral beneficiation process. The cost of
grinding media is of the same order as that of energy usage during comminution. Thus, any
reductions in ore strength (leading to shorter grinding times, or a reduction of milled tonnage in
recycle) result in significant cost savings from energy and grinding media conservation. Hence any
attempt to reduce electrical energy is one of the important tasks of the researchers. Pretreatment
methods are so many such as thermal, electrical, cryogenic, calcinations or microwave heat treatment
prior to comminution followed by processing of the ore/ mineral are the alternatives to save energy
consumption. The most important properties usually determined for refractories are refractoriness,
working temperature and thermal stability. Thermal shock resistance of refractory materials is one of
the most important characteristics since it determines their performance in many applications.
Thermal shock introduces cracks into the structure and therefore there is need to improve cracking
resistance of material.
As thermal shock is one of the most efficient techniques in the size reduction. In this process,
the solid particles are heated at above 823 K and due to subsequent sudden quenching the particle are
subjected to either rupturing or weakening in the interstitial bonds promoting inter granular fractures
between particles. In most cases, the action is based on thermal expansion and contraction under
sharp and sudden temperatures differential and leading to a potential improvement in grinding
performance as well as the downstream operations. Thus thermal shock treatment is one of the
methods to improve comminution, liberation and magnetic characteristics of ore by weakening the
rock and inducing grain boundary fracture. In thermal shock treatment the ore minerals are subjected
to thermal expansion by heat treatment and followed by rapid contraction of minerals by sudden
quenching. The literature has been reviewed on the thermal treatment and energy saving on grinding
of different samples.
Alumina based ceramic fibres and alumina based ceramic [1] were used to produce
composite material. Behaviour of composite ceramics after thermal shock treatments was
investigated. Thermal shock of the samples was evaluated using water quench test. Surface
deterioration level of samples was monitored by image analysis before and after a number of
quenching cycles. Ultrasonic measurements were done on samples after quench tests. Dynamic
Young modulus of elasticity and strength degradation were calculated using measured values
of ultrasonic velocities. Strengths deterioration was calculated using the non-destructive
measurements and correlated to degradation of surface area and number of quenches. The addition of
small amount of ceramic fibres improves the strengths and diminishes the loss of mechanical
properties of samples during thermal shock experiments. Rao etal. [2] discussed in their paper that
the crude bauxite requires a magnetic intensity of 14,000 gauss for the removal of ferruginous
minerals. The bauxite calcined at 800C requires magnetic intensity of about 7000 Gauss, whereas
the reduced bauxite needs less than 2000 Gauss for separation of iron. Banerjee and Rao [3]
investigated that a total energy saving of the order of 32% could be achieved when vanadiferrous
magnetite sample is preheated at 800C for a period of 30 minutes followed by quenching and
grinding for 50 minutes in a batch ball mill.
It has been earlier [4,5] found that the value added materials such as filler and refractory can
be recovered from PLK rocks. To recover these value added materials, the PLK rocks are to be
comminuted by stage crushing to obtain a product d
80
passing size 100 micron. Thus the recovered
value added material contain d
80
passing size 100 micron, which has to be ground to very fine size
suitable for filler industrial applications. This process is energy intensive. Hence any attempt to save
one unit of power per tons in the specific energy consumption is of high significance.
International Journal of Mechanical Engineering and Technology (IJMET), ISSN 0976 6340(Print),
ISSN 0976 6359(Online), Volume 5, Issue 5, May (2014), pp. 83-90 IAEME
85

2. EXPERIMENTAL

The PLK rock sample was collected from Damanjodi bauxite mine, Orissa, India.The sample
was generated at the time of bauxite mining. The sample was prepared by stage crushing to -10 +5
mm size. The representative samples of each 2 kg had been prepared separately and subjected to pre-
treatment at various temperatures (823 K and 1123 K) for one hour in a muffle furnace and rapidly
quenched in water at ambient temperature. These the sample was dried and ground in a standard ball
mill (Fig.1) used for the determination of the Bonds work index. The PLK sample was also subjected
to dry grinding without and with pre treatment for comparison study. Percentage of fines generated
was determined at different periods of grinding by using standard sieves. The mineralogical phase
analysis of the samples was carried out using PANalytical X-Pert X-ray powder diffractometer with
Mo-K radiation (=0.709) from 6 to 40 scanning angle at a scanning rate of 0.02/sec. This
technique was based on the Braggs principle.


Fig 1: Experimental set up for Bonds work index using standard batch ball mill

The Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM) studies were carried out by using HITACHI
S 3400N. High resolution and large depth of field coupled with simple sample preparation
technique detected crystal morphology at a microscope. It has High scanning electron resolution of
10nm at 3Kv. The magnification of the instrument used was 5X- 300,00X and alternating voltage
0.3-30 kV.

2.1 Bonds work index: The PLK feed sample was prepared by stage crushing to all passing a 6
mesh sieve. The weight of 700 cc sample was placed in the mill. The grinding conditions are given
below. These studies were carried out in a standard ball mill 150 mm X 150 mm size
Weight of balls, Kg : 20.125
No. of balls Size, inches Size, mm
43 1.45 36.83
67 1.17 29.72
10 1 25.4
71 0.75 19.05
94 0.61 15.94
Sample weight: Initially weight of 700 cc volume sample
Revolutions: Initially the experiment starts with from 100 revolutions
Test mesh sieve: 150 micron (100 mesh)

International Journal of Mechanical Engineering and Technology (IJMET), ISSN 0976
ISSN 0976 6359(Online), Volume 5, Issue 5, May (2014), pp.
The materials with the balls was charged to the ball mill
grounded sample was screened with the test sieve and the undersize sample was weighed and fresh
unsegragated feed was added to the oversize to bring its weight back to that of original charge. The
numbers of revolution required was calculated from the results of the previous period to produce
sieve undersize equal to the 1/3.5 of the total charge in the mill. The grinding period cycles were
continued until the net grams of sieve undersize produce per mill revolution reache
Then the undersize product and circulating load was screen analysed and the last three net grams per
revolution (Gbp) is the ball mill grindability.

The Bond Work index was calculated from the following equation


Where
F is the size in microns at which 80 percent of the new feed to ball mill passes
P is the size in micron at which 80 percent of the last cycle sieve undersize product passes
P
1
is the opening in microns of the sieve size
W
i
is the work index in kWh/ton
Power requirement/ton (P
G
) is calculated in hp

-------------------------------------------------------------

Where
W
i
is the work index in kWh/ton
F is the size in microns at which 80 percent of th
P is the size in micron at which 80 percent of the last cycle sieve undersize product passes

2.2 Power requirement/ton (P
T
) for thermal treatment

--------------------------------------------------------------
Where
M = mass, C
P
= heat capacity, dT = temperature difference
Cp (Cals/deg. Mole) values for Al
2
equation

3. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

Physical and chemical analysis of PLK rock sample is given in Table 1 which indicates that
the bulk density is of 1.3 g/cm
3
, whereas true density is of 2.7 g/cm
4.3% of Fe
2
O
3
. XRD of PLK rock is shown in Fig
phase along with other phases of gibbsite, goethite and quartz. SEM
that this sample contains clay patches with iron content inside these patches which is clearly seen in
International Journal of Mechanical Engineering and Technology (IJMET), ISSN 0976
6359(Online), Volume 5, Issue 5, May (2014), pp. 83-90 IAEME
86
The materials with the balls was charged to the ball mill and ground at 100 revolutions. The
grounded sample was screened with the test sieve and the undersize sample was weighed and fresh
unsegragated feed was added to the oversize to bring its weight back to that of original charge. The
quired was calculated from the results of the previous period to produce
sieve undersize equal to the 1/3.5 of the total charge in the mill. The grinding period cycles were
continued until the net grams of sieve undersize produce per mill revolution reache
Then the undersize product and circulating load was screen analysed and the last three net grams per
revolution (Gbp) is the ball mill grindability.
The Bond Work index was calculated from the following equation
---------------------------------------- (1)
F is the size in microns at which 80 percent of the new feed to ball mill passes
P is the size in micron at which 80 percent of the last cycle sieve undersize product passes
is the opening in microns of the sieve size tested
) is calculated in hp
------------------------------------------------------------- (2)
F is the size in microns at which 80 percent of the new feed to ball mill passes
P is the size in micron at which 80 percent of the last cycle sieve undersize product passes
) for thermal treatment
-------------------------------------------------------------- (3)
= heat capacity, dT = temperature difference
2
O
3
.SiO
2
at different temperatures were evaluated from Perrys
--------------------------------------- (4)
RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
ysical and chemical analysis of PLK rock sample is given in Table 1 which indicates that
, whereas true density is of 2.7 g/cm
3
. It contains 1.66 % of TiO
. XRD of PLK rock is shown in Fig. 2 which indicates a highly crystalline kaolinite
phase along with other phases of gibbsite, goethite and quartz. SEM studies on PLK rocks reveals
clay patches with iron content inside these patches which is clearly seen in
International Journal of Mechanical Engineering and Technology (IJMET), ISSN 0976 6340(Print),
and ground at 100 revolutions. The
grounded sample was screened with the test sieve and the undersize sample was weighed and fresh
unsegragated feed was added to the oversize to bring its weight back to that of original charge. The
quired was calculated from the results of the previous period to produce
sieve undersize equal to the 1/3.5 of the total charge in the mill. The grinding period cycles were
continued until the net grams of sieve undersize produce per mill revolution reaches equilibrium.
Then the undersize product and circulating load was screen analysed and the last three net grams per
(1)
P is the size in micron at which 80 percent of the last cycle sieve undersize product passes
(2)
P is the size in micron at which 80 percent of the last cycle sieve undersize product passes
(3)
at different temperatures were evaluated from Perrys
(4)
ysical and chemical analysis of PLK rock sample is given in Table 1 which indicates that
. It contains 1.66 % of TiO
2
and
2 which indicates a highly crystalline kaolinite
on PLK rocks reveals
clay patches with iron content inside these patches which is clearly seen in
International Journal of Mechanical Engineering and Technology (IJMET), ISSN 0976 6340(Print),
ISSN 0976 6359(Online), Volume 5, Issue 5, May (2014), pp. 83-90 IAEME
87

Fig. 3. Effect of thermal shock treatment at different temperature on PLK rock sample with respect to
the production of fines passing 150 m size particles are shown in Fig 4. The results of these studies
indicate that the grinding time required for a production of 40% fines (below 150 m size) decreases
from 7 minutes to 3.4 minutes. The resultant savings in grinding time is observed to be in the range
of 45.7% to 51.4% as compared with the sample without any pretreatment. It is explained as under
thermal shock treatment, selective heating of the different mineral components resulted in thermal
stress cracking [5].

Table 1: Physiochemical properties of PLK rock sample
Physical properties
Bulk density, g/cm
3
True density, g/cm
3
Porosity, % Angle of repose,
1.3 2.7 51.9 35.9
Chemical properties
Al
2
O
3 ,
% SiO
2,
% Fe
2
O
3,
% TiO
2,
% LOI
,
%
37.24 40.64 4.3 1.66 16.26

Grain boundary fracture as well as micro-crack formation also occur in thermal shock treated
samples. Typical cracks present in the PLK rock sample before and after thermal shock treatment can
be seen in Fig 5. Due to development of cracks along the boundary and within the grains the rock
mass will become weaken and hence facilitate for selective liberation of minerals or enhance the size
reduction of PLK rock sample.


Fig 2: XRD pattern of PLK rock
International Journal of Mechanical Engineering and Technology (IJMET), ISSN 0976 6340(Print),
ISSN 0976 6359(Online), Volume 5, Issue 5, May (2014), pp. 83-90 IAEME
88


Fig 3: SEM of PLK rock samples Fig. 4: Effect of grinding time on thermal shock
treatment of PLK rock



Fig. 5: Effect of thermal shock treatment on development of cracks within the PLK rock sample


Effect of thermal shock treatment on work index of PLK rock and power requirement per ton
of ore to be ground is shown in Table 2. It indicates that the work index of natural PLK rock is 7.9
kWh/ton and the corresponding power requirement is 1100.4 kWh, while with increasing thermal
shock temperature, the work index is found to be 7.5 kWh/ton and 3.2 kWh/ton at 793K and 1093K
respectively. The corresponding power requirements at these temperatures are found to be 1048.3
kWh and 473.8 kWh. The data on the total power requirement for thermal shock treatment and
grinding of the sample to the desired size (150 m), is shown in Table 2. The data indicate that the
power requirement for natural PLK rock is 1100.4 kWh whereas for thermal treated sample at 823 K
the total power requirement is 1119.9 kWh. However, it is found that the thermal treated sample at
1123 K temperature for a period of 60 minutes, the total power requirement is units 580.7 kWh/ton.
The total energy saving of 52.8 % has been achieved by thermal treatment of the sample. The details
International Journal of Mechanical Engineering and Technology (IJMET), ISSN 0976 6340(Print),
ISSN 0976 6359(Online), Volume 5, Issue 5, May (2014), pp. 83-90 IAEME
89

are given in Table 3. Such power saving has been reported earlier by Banerjee and Rao (Banerjee
and Rao, 2000) thermal treated bauxite.

Table 2: Power requirement of PLK rock sample
Temp, K Grindability, gbp
Work index,
kWh/ton
Power/ton for
grinding, kWh
Natural 3.5 7.9 1100.4
823 3.3 7.5 1048.3
1123 2.7 3.2 473.8

Table 3: Power requirement of PLK rock sample after thermal shock and energy saving
Temp,K
Power/ton for
grinding, kWh
(a)
Power/ton for
thermal treatment,
kWh (b)
Total Power/ton
for grinding, kWh
(a+b)
Energy
saving, %
Natural 1100.4 - 1100.4 -
823 1048.3 71.9 1119.9 -
1123 473.8 106.9 580.7 52.8

The result drawn from this attempt is that the power can be saved in the size reduction of the
material. Thermal shock treatment is one of the processes which can be adoptable by the
communiation industries. PLK rocks, the bauxite mining waste can be a value added raw material for
filler industries which need very fine particles. In view of this, the thermal shock treatment is widely
acceptable for size reduction in microns and also saves energy, which can be used further for
application in filler industries after suitable beneficiation.

4. CONCLUSIONS

Partially Lateritised Khondalite (PLK) rocks are the waste materials generated during mining
of bauxite. The results of thermal shock treatment on PLK rock reveal that a total energy saving of
the order of 52.8 % could be achieved when a sample preheated at 1123 K for 60 minutes followed
by sudden quenching in water followed by grinding. This may be due to a fact that in thermal shock
treatment the ore minerals are subjected to thermal expansion by heat treatment and followed by
rapid contraction of minerals by sudden quenching.

5. ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

The authors are thankful to Professor B.K. Mishra, Director, for his kind permission to utilize
infrastructure at CSIR IMMT, Bhuaneswar and encouraging for publishing this paper.

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ISSN 0976 6359(Online), Volume 5, Issue 5, May (2014), pp. 83-90 IAEME
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