Improving efficiency of vein-type deposit development through flexible ore quality management

Many vein-type deposits of particularly valuable mineral raw materials are characterized by low thickness of ore bodies, complex bedding conditions and significantly uneven distribution of the useful component in ore, which predetermines a significant reduction in the quality of the extracted ore mass due to dilution and misgrading. It should be noted that ores of certain formation types are much more brittle compared to the host rocks, and therefore, during blasting, they are intensively crushed into small fractions enriched with a useful component. The author proposes a technological scheme that allows increasing the efficiency of underground development of vein-type deposits, the ores of which can be fractionated by size classes with concentration of the useful component in the ore fines. The technology provides the possibility of flexible management of the quality of the ore mass extracted from the subsoil by means of large-portion sorting and subsequent differentiated screening with the separation of productive fractions of various size classes, carried out on screens with screening surfaces for coarse, medium and fine screening, respectively. The selected productive fractions of ore are transported to the beneficiation plant, and the substandard fractions are transported to a special warehouse. The conducted experimental studies of a sample of poor tin ore showed a high variability in the content of the useful component with a significant enrichment of ore fines, in connection with which, by means of screening of poor ores, which make up a significant part of the considered excavation block, an additional volume of conditioned mineral raw materials can be obtained. The implementation of the proposed technological scheme will ensure an increase in the end-to-end extraction of metal and will increase the profitability of mining and processing production.