Production of High-grade Concentrate from Butte Copper Ores-Results of Laboratory Investigations

THE copper-bearing ores concentrated at the Anaconda plant of the Anaconda Copper Mining Co. are principally a mixture of copper and iron sulfides associated in a gangue consisting of quartz, lightly altered granite and feldspars, with sphalerite and galena and more rarely barite and hubnerite as accessory minerals. The predominant sulfide is pyrite. The copper minerals present are: chalcocite, bornite (Erubescite), enargite, chalcopyrite, covellite, tetrahedrite and some tennantite. Normal concentrator practice removes a slime prior to ball-mill grinding. The deslimed ore is ground to approximately 10 per cent plus 65 mesh for flotation. Two selective flotation circuits are used, one for deslimed ore and one for slime. The metallurgical results obtained are shown in Table 1.