Effect of collector and depressant on monomineralic surfaces in fine wolframite flotation system

Except wolframite monominerals, other monominerals, such as scheelite, fluorite, calcite, and quartz, exist in wolframite flotation. Therefore, it is necessary to investigate the floatability of main monominerals in wolframite flotation. This paper mainly investigated the effects of benzohydroxamic acid as a collector and sodium silicate as a depressant on different monominerals surfaces by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, including wolframite, scheelite, fluorite, calcite, quartz. The results indicated that the chemisorption of GYB followed by formation of five-membered ring chelate on wolframite and scheelite surfaces is responsible for inducing the floatability. A small number of GYB molecules stayed on fluorite surfaces by physical adsorption. GYB did not adsorb on calcite and quartz surfaces. SS did not adsorb on wolframite and scheelite surfaces. For fluorite and calcite, H2SiO3, HSiO3- and SiO32- can absorb on fluorite surface at low silicate concentrations and the depression was also achieved by ligand exchange between F and Si(OH)4. For quartz, H2SiO3, HSiO3- and SiO32- can absorb on quartz surfaces by supply of external pairs.