A novel quantificational assessment method of frothers effect on bubble characteristics

Abstract

A new visual method for quantitative measurement of frothers effect and flotation efficiency was presented. A self-designed electrolytic cell was chosen as the reaction environment with sodium chloride (NaCl) as the electrolyte. Constant current, supplied by a self-designed power supplier and fixed cathode and anode equipment, guaranteed the constant bubble volume per unit time. Even aperture of the cathode material guaranteed the original bubbles size to be uniform. Bubble generating equipment was connected with a microscopical camera. Statistic data collected by high speed charge-coupled device (CCD) and processed by software Sigmascan and Matlab could reflect bubble characteristics. The efficiency of dipropylene glycol monomethyl ether (DPM) and tripropylene glycol n-butyl ethel (TPnB) were measured at the same condition, and 2×10⁻⁴ mol/L and 5×10⁻² mol/L were found to be the inflexions of bubble size changes.

Keywords

frother / bubble / image processing / data screening / flotation efficiency

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