Upgrading of a specularite ore for industrial usage

In this study, the upgrading of a specularite ore from the Feke district in Adana, Turkey was investigated applying shaking table, wet magnetic separation, microwave heating followed by wet magnetic separation, roasting followed by wet magnetic separation, falcon concentrator, anionic and reverse cationic flotation methods. As a result of the X-Ray Diffraction (XRD) analyses, it was determined that the ore mainly contains specularite, goethite, hematite, and some other iron oxide minerals along with quartz and mica as gangue minerals. According to XRF analysis, the ore contains 57.90 % Fe. It was possible to produce concentrates (> 62 Fe) suitable for industrial usage by any methods above. Under the optimum conditions, for shaking table, wet magnetic, microwave heating, roasting, falcon concentrator, reverse anionic, and reverse cationic flotation methods, Fe grades (%) were 64.47%, 68.90%, 68.90%, 69.10%, 63.93%, 63.04%, and 68.95% respectively.