The Effect of Microwave Treatment on Dry Grinding Kinetics of Iron Ore

The effect of microwave treatment on the grinding kinetics of an iron ore was assessed using mono-sized materials of −2.360 + 2.0 mm, −1.400 + 1.180 mm, −1.0 + 0.850 mm, and −0.355 + 0.300 mm as feed. Microwave-treated samples were kept in a multimode microwave oven with 1100 W input power. The grinding tests were conducted using a laboratory ball mill under identical conditions to allow a comparative analysis of the results. The specific rates of breakage (Si) and cumulative breakage distribution function (Bi,j) values, as grinding breakage parameters, were determined for those size fractions of untreated and microwave-treated feeds. It was determined that breakage of iron ore followed a first-order behavior for fine feed sizes and deviated from first order for coarse feed size. The specific rate of breakage parameters of untreated iron ore was compared with microwave-treated iron ore under the same experimental conditions and it was found that microwave-treated materials break faster than untreated in terms of the Si and A values. Breakage parameters showed that treated materials produce more coarse material than untreated material in terms of the γ value of Bi,j.