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MINERALOGÍA APLICADA A LA DEFINICIÓN DEL TIPO DE REFRACTARIEDAD EN LA MINA DE ORO EL ZANCUDO, TITIRIBÍ, ANTIOQUIA

2005; Industrial University of Santander; Volume: 27; Issue: 2 Linguagem: Inglês

2145-8553

Analía Gallego, Donna Zapata, Marco Antonio García-Márquez,

Environmental and Ecological Studies

The physic and chemistry characteristics that give to the El Zancudo gold mine certain degree of refractoriness, were determined, regarding some initial bases about the problems that could occur at the moment of developing a conventional benefit system. The main metallic minerals found are arsenopyrite, pyrite and in smaller proportions sphalerite, tetrahedrite, boulangerite, galena, chalcopyrite, jamesonita, pyrrhotite and gold. Around 80% of the grains of gold are less than 30µm size, additionally, gold appears principally as small inclusions (<10µm) in pyrite (36%) and arsenopyrite (6,3%), which involve problems of liberation in the grinding process, requiring some type of pretreatment before cyanuration processes; on the other hand, the existence of silver within the gold grains (28 Wt.%), it could generate secondary silver sulfur coating and it becomes in a impermeable barrier for the cyanide. The existence of minerals like arsenopyrite and the pyrite can generate problems during the cyaniding due to the formation of different sulfur and arsenic composes which consume both oxygen and cyanide; all these factors cause that the velocity of dissolution be diminished. Finally, the sericite can generate a preg-robbing effect, diminishing the efficiency of the cyaniding process.