Minerals Engineering 22 (2009) 104–106

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Minerals Engineering
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/mineng

Technical Note

Procedure for determination of ball Bond work index in the commercial operations
R. Ahmadi *, Sh. Shahsavari
Iran Mineral Processing Research Center (IMPRC), Karaj, Tehran, Islamic Republic of Iran

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: The Bond ball mill grindability test is run in a laboratory until a circulating load of 250% is developed. It
Received 2 March 2008 provides the Bond Ball Mill Work Index which expresses the resistance of material to ball milling. This
Accepted 11 April 2008 happens after 7–10 grinding cycles, which shows that the procedure is a lengthy and complex one and
Available online 3 June 2008
is therefore susceptible to procedural errors. Starting from the first-order grinding kinetics defined by
means of the Bond ball mill, this paper discusses a simplified procedure for a rapid determination of
Keywords: the work index by just two grinding tests. The applicability of the simplified procedure has been proved
Iron ores
on samples of copper and Iron ores that are located in Iran. The values obtained by this procedure do not
Grinding
Modelling
differ by more than 7% from those obtained in the standard Bond test.
Mineral processing Ó 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction 1989). The work index (Wi) is calculated in a laboratory-scale ball

mill with Bond equation. The Bond work index has been widely
A Bond Ball Mill Work Index test is a standard test for determin- used in designing full-scale mills but the Bond test is rather com-
ing the ball mill work index of a sample of ore. It was developed by plex, lengthy susceptible to procedural errors and this is why at-
Fred Bond in 1952 and modified in 1961 (JKMRC CO., 2006). This tempts have been made to abbreviate and simplify Bond test
index is widely used in the mineral industry for comparing the procedure (Weiss, 1985).
resistance of different materials to ball milling, for estimating the
energy required for grinding, and for ball mill scale-up. The test 2. Grinding kinetics in the Bond ball mill
has existed for more than 40 years (Man, 2002). Because of the dif-
ficulty in determination of this index, alternatives to the standard Tests of grinding kinetics in the Bond ball mill (Figs. 1 and 2) has
method have been developed by many researchers (Vedat and shown that over a shorter grinding period, the process follows the
Huseyin, 2003). law of first order kinetics
In the determination of ball mill work index 15 kg of represen-
tative ore at 100% + 3.35 mm is crushed to 100%  3.35 mm (Am- R ¼ R0 ekt ð1Þ
tech, 2006). where R = test-sieve oversize at the time (t); R0 = test sieve at the
The first grinding test is started with an arbitrarily chosen num- beginning of grinding (t = 0); k: grinding rate constant; t = grinding
ber of mill revolutions. At the end of each grinding cycle, the entire time.
product is discharged from the mill and is screened on a test sieve. The grinding rate constant (k) can be determined from just one
Fresh feed material is added to the oversize to bring the total grinding test. From Eq. (1) it follows that:
weight back to that of the original charge. This charge is then re-
ln R0  ln R
turned to the mill. The number of revolutions in the second grind- k¼ ð2Þ
ing cycle is calculated so as to gradually produce the 250% t
circulating load. After the second cycle, the same procedure of This makes it possible to achieve substantial time savings and
screening and grinding is continued until the test-sieve under size simplifications in the procedure for determining the work index
produced per mill revolution becomes constant for the last three (Wi).
grinding cycles. This will give the 250% circulating load (Bond,
1961). 3. Simulation of the standard bond test for finding the index
The Bond test takes 7–10 cycles. The test-sieve undersize from
the last grinding cycle is analyzed by screening, (Magdalinovi, In the standard Bond test at a standard 250% circulating load:
R
¼ 2:5 ð3Þ
U
* Corresponding author. Tel.: +98 261 4790010; fax: +98 261 4790019.
E-mail address: r_ahmadi28@yahoo.com (R. Ahmadi). UþR¼M ð4Þ

0892-6875/$ - see front matter Ó 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.mineng.2008.04.008
 R. Ahmadi, Sh. Shahsavari / Minerals Engineering 22 (2009) 104–106 105

100

Cumulative oversize (%)

pc =150 μm

pc = 500 μm

pc = 38 μm
10

1
0 5 10 15 20 25
Grinding Time (minutes)

Fig. 1. The kinetics of iron ore grinding.

100
Cumulative oversize (%)

pc= 500μm

pc= 315μm

10 pc=160μm

1
0 1 2 3 4 5
Grinding Time (minutes)

Fig. 2. The kinetics of copper ore grinding.

where R: weight of the test sieve oversize (g), U: weight of the new where tc = grinding time in a standard grinding cycle after which
feed (g), M: weight of the mill feed (g). the oversize (R) on the test sieve is (2.5/3.5)M, which corresponds
From Eqs. (3) and (4) it follows that: to the 250% circulating load; k: grinding rate constant for coarser
product, defined by (2).
2:5
R¼ M ð5Þ With the Bond ball mill, the total number of mill revolutions (N)
3:5
1 is taken into account rather than the grind time (t). Since
R¼ M ð6Þ
3:5 N
t¼ ð12Þ
In a standard grinding cycle at the 250% circulating load, the n
weight of the test sieve oversize at the beginning of grinding (R0) is By substituting the expression of the t from Eq. (12) into (2) and
(11), it follows that:
2:5 1
R0 ¼ MþR¼ Mr0 ð7Þ nðln R0  ln RÞ
3:5
 3:5
 k¼ ð13Þ
2:5 1 N
R0 ¼ þ r0 M ð8Þ lnð1 þ 0:4r 0 Þ
3:5 3:5 Nc ¼ n ð14Þ
k
where r0 = the proportion of test sieve oversize in the new feed (ex-
pressed in parts of unity). where n = number of mill revolutions per minute; N: total number
From Eq. (1) which gives the grinding cycle, the following of mill revolutions; Nc: total number of mill revolutions giving the
expression can be derived for the 250% circulating load: (2.5/3.5)M test sieve oversize, which corresponds to the 250% circu-
  lating load. The derived Eqs. (7), (13), and (14) make it possible to
2:5 2:5 1 abbreviate the Bond test to only two grinding tests. The abbreviated
M¼ þ r0 Mekt ð9Þ
3:5 3:5 3:5 procedure for finding the work index is as follows:
 
2:5 2:5 1
¼ þ r0 ekt ð10Þ
3:5 3:5 3:5 1. The work index is determined from feed crushed to
lnð1 þ 0:4r 0 Þ 100%  3.327 mm (the same as for the standard Bond
tc ¼ ð11Þ
k test).
106 R. Ahmadi, Sh. Shahsavari / Minerals Engineering 22 (2009) 104–106

2. The feed is screened to determine its size distribution which Table 1

is then plotted on a graph. Comparative presentation of the work index values obtained by means of the Bond
and the abbreviated procedures
3. A 700 cm3 sample is collected and weighed (M).
4. The value of R = (2.5/3.5)M is calculated. Sample Pc Work index (kw h/t) Difference (%)
5. From the original feed an adequate sample is taken and (lm) D ¼ WiðBÞWiðAÞ  100
Bond test, Abbreviated test, WiðBÞ
screened on a test sieve. The under size is discarded while Wi(B) Wi(A)
the over size is retained. At least R oversize has to be pre- Iron ore 500 8.10 8.46 4.4
pared for the two grinding tests. 150 12.20 11.55 +5.3
6. Two separate samples, weighting (1/3.5)M g each, necessary 38 15.10 15.86 5.0

for the two grinding tests, are collected from the original Copper ore 500 15.40 14.57 +5.4
feed. 315 13.79 12.83 +7.0
160 11.84 11.46 +3.2
7. Two samples are formed for the two grinding tests by mix-
80 12.90 13.07 1.3
ing test sieve oversize weighting (2.5/3.5)M (item 3) with
the sample weighting (1/3.5)M (item4).
8. The proportion of the coarse size (R0) in the samples is
calculated. dure can indicate the initial number of mill revolutions derived
9. The first sample is fed into the Bond mill and is ground for an from Eq. (14), with which the Bond test for the determination of
arbitrarily chosen number of mill revolutions the work index could be commenced. Thus, the number of grinding
(N = 50, 100, 150, . . .). tests in the standard Bond procedure can be reduced.
10. After grinding, the entire sample is screened on a test sieve
and the oversize is weighed (R). 4. Conclusions
11. The oversize grinding rate constant (k) is calculated from Eq.
(13). Based on the defined first-order grinding kinetics in the Bond
12. The total number of mill revolutions (Nc) for the second ball mill, a procedure has been developed for the rapid determina-
grinding test is calculated from Eq. (14). tion of the work index (Wi) by means of just two grinding tests.
13. The second sample is fed into Bond mill and is ground for Nc The applicability of the proposed abbreviated procedure has
mill revolutions. been proved on samples of copper and iron ore. The differences be-
14. After grinding, the entire sample is screened on the test tween the values of the work index obtained in the two test proce-
sieve. Both the oversize and the undersize are weighed. dures do not exceed 7%.
The weight of the oversize should be equal or approximately The procedure presented here can be very useful for monitoring
equal to (2.5/3.5)M whereas the weight of the undersize (m) day-to-day variation of the grindability of ore and for control of
should be: m = (1/3.5)M. grinding at commercial operations. Its great merit is that it allows
15. Size distribution of the undersize from the second test is for a reduction of the number of grinding tests in the Bond test
determined by means of screen analysis and the value P is procedure.
determined graphically.
16. The weight (G) of the new undersize obtained per mill revo- Acknowledgement
lution in the second test is calculated from:
1 The authors gratefully acknowledge the Iran Mineral Processing
m  3:5 Mð1  r0 Þ
G¼ ð15Þ Research Center (IMPRC) for this work.
Nc
17. The work index (Wi) is derived from the Bond formula. References

The work index (Wi) has been obtained for the sample of iron
and copper ore following both the standard Bond procedure and
the abbreviated procedure as described in this paper.
The results are given in Table 1.
By comparing the values of the work index obtained by means
of the Bond and the abbreviated test procedures it can be seen that
the differences never exceed 7%. This confirms that the abbreviated
procedure can be employed for a rapid and simple determination
of the work index.
The proposed procedure can be very useful in routine monitor-
ing of ore grindability and for the control of the abbreviated proce-
Amtech CO., 2006. Western Australia, Technical features – Bond Ball Mill Work
Index (BWI).
Bond, F.C., 1961. Crushing and grinding calculations part I and II. British Chemical
Engineering 6 (6 and 8).
JKMRC CO., 2006. Procedure for BBMWI Test.
Magdalinovi, N., 1989. A procedure for rapid determination of the Bond work index.
International Journal of Mineral Processing 27 (1-2), 125–132.
Man, Y.T., 2002. Why is the Bond Ball Mill Grindability Test done the way it is done?
European journal of mineral processing and environmental protection 2 (1).
Vedat, Deniz, Huseyin, Ozdag, 2003. A new approach to Bond grindability and work
index: dynamic elastic parameters. Minerals Engineering Journal 16 (3), 211–
217.
Weiss, N.L., 1985. Mineral Processing Handbook. Society of Mining Engineers,
AIMM, New York. 2078.