Insight into the effect of ultrasonic treatment on surface properties and flotation behavior of chalcopyrite after galvanic corrosion of grinding media and chalcopyrite

Ultrasonic treatment is an effective means to promote chalcopyrite flotation. Chalcopyrite needs to be grinded before flotation production. During the grinding process, galvanic corrosion occurs between chalcopyrite and iron grinding media. Galvanic corrosion significantly affects the efficacy of ultrasonic treatment on chalcopyrite flotation. Nonetheless, there is still a lack of research on ultrasonic treatment of chalcopyrite after galvanic corrosion. In this study, micro-flotation tests, SEM-EDS, TOF-SIMS, XPS, ICP-OES and electrochemical tests were used to study the effects of ultrasonic treatment on the surface properties and flotation behavior of chalcopyrite before and after galvanic corrosion under different ultrasonic conditions and galvanic corrosion conditions. The results show that in the absence of galvanic corrosion, short time and low power ultrasonic treatment can improve chalcopyrite floatability. However, when the chalcopyrite after strong galvanic corrosion is subjected to ultrasonic treatment, the increase of galvanic corrosion temperature, galvanic corrosion time, ultrasound power and ultrasound time result in a marked reduction of the flotation recovery of chalcopyrite. The synergistic effect of ultrasonic and galvanic corrosion significantly inhibits the flotation recovery of chalcopyrite, which may provide a new potential way for the inhibition of sulfide ore in flotation production. The research results are helpful to expand the use range of ultrasonic processing for sulfide mineral pretreatment and flotation, and provide a theoretical reference for the application of ultrasonic treatment in sulfide minerals with galvanic corrosion.