Almonty Industries Inc T.AII

Dirty, Nitty-Gritty Details. Compiation 09-10 2019.

[5ilverlining808]

FYI.
Most of you investors will find this boring.
But I had to bring it all forward to slow the "Langoliers" from nipping at the heels of time.
Older posts are being deleted. This one does not reflect the current mine plan.

Any how, I put this all together in one big chunk and it is old from September-October 2019.

There is only one poster that has interest in the process, and that is "true" DD.

1st Stage : Dump Hopper.

I'm compiling a series of animations, videos and info for each stage of the Sangdong process plant as shown in the flow sheet from 2016 FS as best as I can for those that might need a better understanding of the process.

This first stage starts from the dump hopper to the static grizzly on top, to the rock breaker.

- We all know the truck reverses to do a dump into the hopper (no toilet paper required).
- There is a static "grizzly bar" system on top of the hopper that ensures nothing bigger that the primary jaw crusher can accept will not enter the system and cause a blockage at the bottom of the hopper.
- A pedestal rock breaker boom will be installed at the top of the hopper to break all large rocks to size and fit through the top grizzly.

https://www.911metallurgist.com/blog/static-grizzly-screen-as-a-rock-separator

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CanjpvsaWXs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=olx1dkjktZE

This one covers most equipment needs for all mining and processing :

https://transmin.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Brochure_EPS-Overview_English_Web_Rev2.pdf

2nd Stage : Dump Hopper to Primary Jaw Crusher.

- An apron feeder will extract the ore form the bottom of the dump hopper to the vibrating grizzly screen.
This machine is like a bulldozer or tank tractor tread that instead of moving a heavy vehicle over rough ground, it is a stationary tractor tread that move the ground above it to another place in the process using a powerful hydraulic drive.

- On the grizzly screen smaller material will drop through the heavy duty bars of the grizzly on to the conveyor belt prior to the primary  jaw crusher outlet to ensure no unnecessary small material will choke up or cause useless wear on parts.
 - The over sized rock will go into the jaw crusher to drop onto the same conveyor belt after the undersized grizzly outlet and all will be sent into the screening building.

Apron feeders :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cEUdBP5W2Yo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RF_TfWBsSiA

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9-KvXlvDfWM

Vibrating Grizzly Screen :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qK2H2pV9oG8

:Primary Jaw Crusher :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=quKZ-IW-n-Q

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JEXbX2SYvBM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DIwR7BZAnpg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ECbBtcPkI8Y

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IQ41yP7LMII

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LsP7ZGfdGJE

3rd Stage : Screening & Further Crushing

This is all covered in Almonty 3D flyover of the plant at 3.35 minutes.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sdKj2oCu6Ko

Screening :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s28jTSFA3fM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h5p_lvrZCBw

Secondary & tertiary cone crushers :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D7UklCrjlME

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zPX8YIOIJ6E

This a gyrating crusher with a similar principle to cone crusher and the explanation in the video has a lot of useful info. :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1CpjRMICXNM

4th Stage : Stockpile

Not much exciting here, but still a crucial part of the process to ensure the plant can still run using the stockpile as a buffer if anything before hand breaks down or needs regular maintenace, or if blasting is underway in the mine.
I'm not sure what the regulations are for underground blasting, but for me, I would want to be above ground.
Almonty stockpile is in a shed with a tunnel under it using apron feeders to draw material from the bottom and onto a conveyor belt to feed the mills.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DG4LzeAHy0k

5th Stage : Mills

According to the 2016 FS flowsheet :
material from the stockpile will be conveyed first into the rod mill for initial grinding, then pumped up to a cyclone cluster system to separate fines that will flow to the flotation circuit.
The heavier oversize from the cyclones will be gravity fed into the ball mill for further grinding and then to be reclassified through the cyclones, and round and round it goes untill it will be accepted for the next stage.

Rod mill :
This is my favourite video that shows just how a hard rock process can grind the grinder rods (old day video still stands today, but with more robust grades of steel rods now in use). :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1r1ZOmbOczk

Rods need to be constantly added as old ones wear out :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1xe04RAE_HI

Ball mill :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F0pkNo5H4RA

This is not a safe work place :
Obviously a Russian clip with all the back ground songs, but just imagine if a worker got too close to that spinning drum ? :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tL21JCLG9s8

Cyclones :

https://www.911metallurgist.com/blog/hydrocyclone-workingprinciple

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8xYMRWNInw8

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7N4GVmV9jjM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0G4jy5XoBpo

An explanation in depth and a must read that covers much more :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aVQ9B3LtCPk

After this stage things become a bit grey for me as to what the flotation and chemical process is,
due to the new $4.5 miln deal to increase recover rate from 70% to 90% and it must be a hush-hush no disclosure contract, hence...maybe.... no new news on the pilot plant..

From Sage post October 1 2019 :

https://stockhouse.com/companies/bullboard?symbol=t.aii&postid=30184648

PHEW.... an extensive exercise to date, and still more to come next week end, maybe.

6th Stage : Processing ??

Things become a bit grey for me here as to what the flotation and chemical process is and onwards down the line,
Due to the age of the FS flowsheet, the new flotation tech. from KIGAM and partners and Metso plus DH Tech involvement, all of this is a bit sketchy at the moment.

In the 2016 FS for the first time (tonight) I noticed a footnote below the flow sheet that stated :
" Note: Molybdenum flotation and interstage thickener to be eliminated."
I pointed out in an earlier post that the 3D flyover video showed a grey building in between the mill building and the thickeners, and it was not mentioned in the video.
Eliminated for now, but the space might just be allocated for that future purpose ?

 

6.1 stage : Flotation And The Rest ?

Nothing much to see here, it's pretty much just like a giant milk shake machine for flotation and the rest of the tanks in the process.
They are all in a row with the first tank at the top of the row and all other tanks are progressively lower than the last to create a gravity cascade effect.
Flotation bank. sulphide bank, cleaning cells, scheelite flotation and scavenging cells and scheelite cleaning unit.

- The first tank separates larger ore (micron sizes using chemicals and high speed agitator mixers) and cascades the smaller ore to the next tank for further break down in size and separation from waste.
- Now the first tanks oversize ore might be recycled back into itself, or sent back to the ball mill for further grinding.
- The second tank will further break down and separate ore from waste, and send the smaller sized ore to the third tank, while the over sized material will be sent back to the first tank for further break down.
- The third tank will do the same but send good ore to the fourth tank, and send oversize back to the second tank for futher break down.
- The fourth, fifth and however many tanks they need will do the same job (ie send good ore down stream and over size back to the previous tank)., and it goes on and on in a similar way with the tank banks for most stages in the process building.
- There might be a few small thickeners involved in this process building.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xsDwbo9bbqk

https://www.metso.com/siteassets/product-pages/flotation-machines/rcs-flotation--brochure-2019-en.pdf

https://www.metso.com/globalassets/saleshub/documents---episerver/flotation_machines_brochure-en_lr.pdf

7th Stage : Thickeners / Clarifiers.

Self explanatory, from simple to in depth.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qtScIThaKus

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p8-kakX0HMI

Typical setup, but not accurate for Sangdong :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YoDkko3vZlI

In depth :

https://www.911metallurgist.com/blog/difference-between-clarifier-and-thickener