New dialkyldithiophosphate collector for silver-containing ore flotation

To create more effective dialkyldithiophosphate collector for use in combination with potassium butyl xanthate in silver ore flotation (for Ducat deposit ores), the effect of a number of dialkyldithiophosphate collectors was studied depending on their surface-active properties and water-repelling ability. It was shown that their collecting ability, at rather similar water-repelling ability increases with strengthening their surface-active properties and reaches maximum at surface tension of 42–45.3 mN/m, and then begins to decrease. The water repellent ability decrease, even at their high surface-active properties, for example, for hydrolyzed samples, significantly reduces silver recovery. Taking into account the studied effect of surface activity and water repellent ability of the reagents, a more efficient dialkyldithiophosphate collector has been developed, which increases silver recovery compared to the standard reagent by 1.8–3.4% depending on ore dressability. Optimal ratio of the proposed dialkyldithiophosphate collector and xanthate dosing also contributes to increasing silver recovery with no reducing the process selectivity.