Ultrafine Grinding of Kokaksu Bauxite ore via Stirred Mill and Ball Mill

The mining industry has a requirement to treat fine (<30 µm) and ultrafine (<10 µm) feed materials, a target difficult or ineffective for traditional milling processes such as conventional tumbling ball milling.  The favoured route has been the use of stirred mills. Stirred mills are primarily used for ultrafine grinding applications in the mining industry. In this study, bauxite samples were grinded to ultrafine size (~5 µm) by a laboratory scale stirred mill and its performance was compared with a laboratory scale conventional ball mill. The stirred mill was found to be more efficient (lower grinding time and lower energy consumption) in ultrafine grinding.