Copper crusher

Copper is mined either at open pit copper ore mines or underground copper ore mines. First the copper ore is blasted, loaded and transported to the primary crushers. Then the ore is crushed and screened, with the fine sulfide ore (~-0.5 mm) going to froth flotation cells for recovery of copper.

In the primary crusher, the ore is broken into smaller pieces of less than 25 centimetres in diameter. Crushed ore is then loaded on to a conveyor belt which takes it to the storage bin. In the storage bin, ball mills and other grinding machine grind the ore until it is a fine powder.

Copper mining process

There are two distinct types of copper ore, the sulfide ore and the oxide ore. The sulfide ores are beneficiated in flotation cells, while the oxide ores are generally leached.

First the copper ore from a open pit mine is blasted, loaded and transported to the primary crushers. Then the ore is crushed and screened, with the fine sulfide ore going to froth flotation cells for recovery of copper. The coarser ore goes to the heap leach, where the copper is subjected to a dilute sulfuric acid solution to dissolve the copper. Then the leach solution containing the dissolved copper is subjected to a process called solvent extraction (SX). The SX process concentrates and purifies the copper leach solution, so the copper can be recovered at a high electrical current efficiency by the electrowinning cells. It does this by adding a chemical reagent to the SX tanks which selectively binds with and extracts the copper, is easily separated from the copper (stripped), recovering as much of the reagent as possible for re-use. The concentrated copper solution is dissolved in sulfuric acid and sent to the electrolytic cells for recovery as copper plates (cathodes). From the copper cathodes, it is manufactured into wire, appliances, etc. that are used in everyday life. Below are some photos of the process equipment at an Arizona Copper Mine.

Copper crushing

When the copper ore come out from the ground, It is loaded into a 300 ton truck for transport to the crusher. The complete copper crushing plant includes jaw crusher as primary crusher, impact crusher and cone crusher. After crushed, the copper ore must be screened out according to size by screening machine and distribute the classified ore to a series of conveyors, for transportation to the mill for further processing.

In the copper ore grinding process, rod mill, ball mill and regrind ball mill are used. Ball mill is the most common copper ore grinding mill in copper ore concentrator.

Gulin can supplies a complete crushing plant for copper mining in Chile, Peru, USA, Congo, Zambia, KZ, Mexico, Belgium, Germany, Zaire, and can also design the special crushing plant according to your requirements.

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