Conventional Ball Mill
Conventional mill has an efficiency of only 6%. The major contributor to such low efficiency is the inappropriate application of energy to the particles of material being ground. While crushers apply energy directly to the particles irrespective of particle size, ball mills have a probabilistic nature of energy application where the energy of specific collision is a function of a ball size and velocities of colliding bodies. Collisions in ball mills do not necessarily result in breakage of material or at another extreme can be of significantly higher energy that is required to break the particles of material captured in a collision.
Existing Solutions
Efficiency increases in ball mills have long been achieved by
segregation of balls by size along the horizontal axis of the mill. This
method resulted in multi-stage grinding with the mill divided into 2 or
more chambers with different ball sizes selected to match the size of
material in each chamber. Additionally, classifying liners are used
within mill chambers to further segregate the grinding media.
This still however is not good enough to provide a sufficient increase in efficiency. Only small marginal increases are achieved.
This still however is not good enough to provide a sufficient increase in efficiency. Only small marginal increases are achieved.
The Conical Mill
The Conical Mill is believed to boost the efficiency of grinding by 2.7
times. The mill works on a principle of automatic segregation of balls
by size which allows for continuous grinding with no
need for chambers. In the ideal scenario every section of the mill along the horizontal axis will have an optimal population of balls suited specifically for the size of the particles being ground while material passes through the mill.
Although Conical Mill design is a simple and elegant solution, the physical process of separation and breakage of material in the mill is complex. The Challenge is to come up with the most efficient set of design and operating parameters of the mill to achieve the ideal energy application and thus maximize the efficiency. This requires more thinking, more modeling, more prototyping, and more creative problem solving.
Although Conical Mill design is a simple and elegant solution, the physical process of separation and breakage of material in the mill is complex. The Challenge is to come up with the most efficient set of design and operating parameters of the mill to achieve the ideal energy application and thus maximize the efficiency. This requires more thinking, more modeling, more prototyping, and more creative problem solving.
