Geopyörä Rock Breakage Test For Geometallurgical Applications
Geopyörä is the state of the art in rock breakage characterisation testing and was developed to allow mining companies to test large quantities of samples at low cost for geometallurgical, comminution design and control applications.
Comminution tests are an essential element in the design and operation of mineral processing plants. Several methods have been developed to assess the breakage characteristics of rocks to generate parameters for modelling. However, most of the existing methods are laborious, expensive and require large samples. Consequently, test work has been traditionally conducted with a few representative reference samples.
On the other hand, geometallurgical modelling programs require an extensive amount of test work to allow understanding the variability of ore properties within the deposit and establish spatial geometallurgical domains that show the differential responses to mineral processing. Therefore, comminution tests for geometallurgy need to be more effective in terms of time, cost and sample size.
The Geopyörä test uses small discrete samples from full or half one-metre section of drill core or less than a kilogram of crushed rocks, allowing its integration with geochemical analysis for better understanding of variability mapping, ideal for geometallurgical applications.
The data measured by Geopyörä can be used to accurately estimate standard comminution parameters as well as rock mechanical properties including:
- t10
- Axb parameter
- Energy and force distributions (i.e. probability of breakage)
- Drop Weight Index (DWi)
- Bond Work Index (BWi)
- Point Load Test Strength Index (Is)
- Uniaxial Compressive Strength (UCS)
The Geopyörä test uses small discrete samples from full or half one-metre section of drill core or less than a kilogram of crushed rocks, allowing its integration with geochemical analysis for better understanding of variability mapping, ideal for geometallurgical applications.
The data measured by Geopyörä can be used to accurately estimate standard comminution parameters as well as rock mechanical properties including:
- t10
- Axb parameter
- Energy and force distributions (i.e. probability of breakage)
- Drop Weight Index (DWi)
- Bond Work Index (BWi)
- Point Load Test Strength Index (Is)
- Uniaxial Compressive Strength (UCS)
Geopyörä allows more samples to be tested at a low-cost to better understand variability and minimise risks
Core Resources has an exclusive licence to use the Geopyörä device for characterising rock breakage parameters.
For further technical information on the test and the comparison to standard rock breakage parameters please see the following papers:
A recent webinar was presented on the Geopyörä test. The webinar can be viewed here.
