Regular Article

Recovery of blast furnace grade iron ore concentrate from iron ore rejects

Research and Development Division, Tata Steel Ltd, Jamshedpur, Jharkhand, India

^⁎ e-mail: d.makhija@tatasteel.com

Received: 27 May 2016
Received in final form: 12 August 2016
Accepted: 16 November 2016

Abstract

The effectiveness of rejigging of jig tailings to recover blast furnace grade iron ore concentrate was investigated. The −10 mm jig tailings sample obtained from Noamundi iron mines of Tata Steel Ltd was subjected to rejigging after crushing to a size of −6 mm, −3 mm and −2 mm. The operating variables i.e. water flow rate and jig amplitude were optimized for the individual samples and the effectiveness of jigging operation was assessed by determining the separation efficiency (SE). The iron recovery and the SE were taken as the index for comparing the performance of rejigging. These indices were assessed by determining the assay values of concentrate and tailings by wet chemical analysis and XRF techniques. Optimum iron recovery of 35% with a Fe grade of 64% was achieved for −3 mm, whereas for −6 mm sample, an iron recovery of 27% with a Fe grade of 63.78% was achieved.