First full-scale cHGMS separator for separation of ilmenite

•First full-scale centrifugal HGMS separator was developed for industrial operation.•The full-scale centrifugal HGMS separator is high selective for ilmenite particles.•Centrifugal HGMS selectivity is superior to that of current PHGMS technologies. Our previous research on centrifugal high gradient magnetic separation (cHGMS) has fully confirmed its effectiveness to improve the separation selectivity of HGMS process, but they were confined in pilot-scale investigations. In this work, the first full-scale CenMag-300 cHGMS separator was used to clean a primary ilmenite concentrate, which was produced from a pulsating HGMS (PHGMS) roughing process. The separation results demonstrated that it was able to improve the TiO2 grade from 15.25 % in feed to 32.49 % in concentrate at TiO2 recovery reaching 81.07 %, which is much superior to that of cyclic SLon-100 PHGMS separator. The outcome from this investigation confirmed the feasibility of cHGMS technology for industrial operation.