ZirChron LLC is equipped with all equipment necessary for high quality mineral separation. Some of the equipment includes: 

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• Retsch jaw crusher

• Bico rock jaw crusher & disk pulverizer

• Wilfey and Gemini water tables

• Frantz magnetic separators

• Heavy liquid (MEI)

• Electro Pulse Disaggregator (EPD, Marx generator)

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These facilities or equipment allow us to offer two ways to process samples: Traditional or by Electro Pulse Disaggregator.

 

 

Why Electro Pulse Disaggregator?

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Conventional laboratory scale processing generally involves crushing >2 inch particles to produce <0.25 inch particles, using small jaw crushers. The small particles are then sieved and ground to as small as 100 mesh for separation using gravitational, magnetic, electrostatic or other methods. This type of processing requires considerable over-grinding in order to achieve high degrees of mineral separation. As a result, grain morphology is degraded or lost, micro-fossils are destroyed and electron microscope analysis of micron-sized particles in soft minerals becomes complicated by the presence of slimes. EPD offers an attractive alternative. When a sufficiently powerful, short-duration, pulsed electric field is applied to rock particles between electrodes submerged in water, extensive ionization occurs along mineral grain boundaries. 

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Electrical Pulse Disaggregation of rock samples occurs along the ionized paths, creating high peak current flow and high internal tensile stress between the mineral grains. The result is selective fracture, breaking up the rock along internal grain boundaries (disaggregation). This provides the following benefits: 1) preferentially fractures rock along natural grain boundaries; 2) preservation of mineral grain morphology; 2) reducation of fines/slimes; 4) preservation of natural grain size distribution; 5) production of fewer multi-mineral grains; and 6) liberation of accessory minerals.

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