Coastal Placer Ore Beneficiation Solution

Phase 1: Pre-Treatment & Washing

Raw beach sand contains debris that must be removed before entering the delicate pumping and gravity circuits.

• Screening: Sand is pumped over a Double-Layer Trommel Screen. The upper deck removes coarse impurities (seashells, driftwood, and gravel), while the lower deck ensures only fine, mineral-bearing sand enters the circuit.
• De-sliming: High-pressure water monitors thoroughly rinse the sand to remove oceanic clay and organic impurities.

Phase 2: Gravity Pre-Enrichment (The Volume Stage)

The goal here is to discard the vast majority of the light quartz/silica sand using zero electricity.

• Spiral Chutes: The washed slurry is pumped to massive banks of Fiberglass Spiral Chutes. Spirals act as the ultimate roughers, utilizing specific gravity to separate the heavy black sands (Ilmenite, Zircon, Rutile) from the light white beach sand.
• Shaking Tables: The heavy sand concentrate from the spirals is passed over 6-S Shaking Tables for further density enrichment before drying.
• Wet Magnetic Separation: A Medium-Intensity Wet Magnetic Separator pulls out highly magnetic impurities (like magnetite) to protect the downstream dry sorting equipment.

Phase 3: Dry Separation & Deep Purification

The heavy mineral concentrate must now be split into individual commercial products (Ilmenite vs. Zircon vs. Rutile).

• Drying: The gravity concentrate is processed through an indirectly heated Rotary Dryer (80-120°C). Precise temperature control prevents altering the surface properties of the minerals.
• Dry Magnetic Separation: The bone-dry sand passes over Multi-Roll Magnetic Separators. This stage extracts the Ilmenite (which is weakly magnetic).
• Electrostatic Purification: The remaining non-magnetic mix is primarily Zircon and Rutile. The sand enters a High-Voltage Arc Plate Electrostatic Separator. Because Rutile is a conductor and Zircon is an insulator, the electrical field cleanly splits them into pure, separate commercial concentrates.

Our comprehensive tri-phase flowsheet ensures maximum value extraction, outputting multiple distinct product lines:

• Ilmenite Concentrate: TiO₂ ≥ 48%
• Zircon Sand Concentrate: ZrO₂ ≥ 65%
• Rutile Concentrate: TiO₂ ≥ 90%
• Monazite Concentrate: Rare Earth Oxides ≥ 55% (Recovery rate ≥ 70%)

Q1: Why do seaside sand plants use so many Spiral Chutes?

A: Heavy mineral sands (like Zircon and Ilmenite) usually only make up 1% to 5% of total beach sand. To make a profit, you must process millions of tons of sand quickly. Spiral chutes are the only equipment capable of handling this massive slurry volume efficiently. Because they use zero electricity (they operate entirely on gravity and centrifugal water flow), they can discard 95% of the worthless silica sand at almost no operational cost.

Q2: How do you separate Rutile from Zircon if they weigh the same?

A: This is the most complex stage of coastal placer mining. Because Rutile and Zircon have nearly identical specific gravities and are both non-magnetic, neither gravity nor magnets can separate them. Our flowsheet dries the sand and runs it through an Electrostatic Separator. Because Rutile is an electrical conductor and Zircon is an insulator, the high-voltage arc plates cleanly split the mixture into two highly valuable, pure concentrates.

End-to-End EPC Seaside Placer Engineering Services

GravityMineral has successfully engineered massive coastal sand mining projects globally, including a 300-ton-per-hour facility in Southeast Asia. Because this process is entirely physical (no chemicals) and skips the crushing phase, the capital investment is typically recovered within 12-18 months.

• Custom Flows Design: Tailored around your specific mineral grades and tonnages.
• Manufacturing & Supply: We build the heavy-duty spirals, magnetic, and electrostatic arrays required for the job.
• Turnkey Commissioning: On-site installation, tuning, and long-term optimization support.

Contact our engineering team today to receive a customized coastal placer wash plant layout and equipment quotation.