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In 1934 the Southern Experiment Station of the U.S. Bureau of Mines in. cooperation with the University of Alabama began an investiga-tion of the availability of kyanite ores as a source of raw material for the manufacture of refractories. Under this program, gravity concentration and flotation tests have been made on two varieties of Georgia kyanite ore, mica schist and massive. Most of the attention has been directed to the mica schist ores, as they are more widely distributed and seem to offer greater economic possibilities than the massive ores. It is evident that the preparation of kyanite for use as a refractory material involves other considerations than the mere elimination of impurities. A concentration process that eliminates impurities satisfactorily may have to be followed by some additional treatment, since the final product must be of a coarse-ness and size ratio that will make it suitable for refractories manufacture. So far in the investigation at the Southern Experiment Station of the U.S. Bureau of Mines only the concentration problem has been considered, and this paper is intended as an interim report.

Jan 1, 1936

By R. V. Whetsel, V. R. Garfias

The production of petroleum in Mexico during 1933 totaled 33,430,-000 bbl., or 625,000 bbl. more than in the previous year. This is the first time since the peak in 1921 that the declining trend of output has been reversed. Drilling activity in the proven areas of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec and the Northern fields increased substantially during the year. The completion of two producers in the Poza Rica area south of Tuxpam and a shallow gas well in the Camargo district near the American border were the outstanding features of development. Late in September the Northern fields and the oil port of Tampico were swept by a hurricane followed by floods which caused loss of life and heavy damage to the City of Tampico and to transportation, tank farms and refineries. For three weeks, owing to the silting of the Tampico Bar and destruction of terminal facilities, no oil could be shipped for export. About half the wells of the Northern fields were closed for a period of 30 days. The prompt and effective steps taken by General Macias, chief of military operations, prevented the spread of epidemics and any serious aftermath of the catastrophe.

Jan 1, 1934

By Morris Muskat

THE method of R. W. Moore1 for determining subsurface interfacial depths by means of integrated curves of apparent resistivity has been analyzed theoretically. It is found that the only unique tangents that can be drawn to such curves are the asymptotes at infinite electrode spacing and the tangents through the origin at vanishing electrode spacing. Explicit expressions have been derived for the relationship between the electrode spacing at the points of intersection of these tangents and the thickness of the surface strata as a function of the conductivity parameters for the two-layer and three-layer earths. It is found that in all cases the electrode spacing at the points of intersection will exceed [3/2] of the thickness of the surface layer, and may even become indefinitely large as the resistivity of the deepest layers increases as compared with that of the surface layer. These results do not agree with the empirical findings of Moore that the intersection of the tangent lines fall at an electrode spacing very approximately equal to the thickness "of the surface layer.

Jan 1, 1944

By Raymond Dugdale, Fathi Habashi

There has been a recent interest in studying the action of anhydrous sulfur trioxide on ores to convert the metal values into a water-soluble form as a substitute for leaching by sulfuric acid. For example, Svenke1 converted the small amounts of uranium in slate ash into a water-soluble form by treating the material with SO, at about 600°C. Chao and Sun found that a variety of aluminum-bearing minerals could be sulfatized by SO, in the temperature range 400° to 600°C usually in the presence of a catalyst such as sodium sulfate. Kruse3 patented a process for beryllium recovery from the low grade ore in Utah by first reacting it with SO, at 560° to 750°C then leaching the product with water. In the present report, the action of SO, was examined in the temperature region 100°-300°C which was not investigated by those workers. Experimental Tests were conducted on a beryllium ore sample from Utah, the analysis of which is given in Table 1. It corresponds closely to a saponite ore type as given by Crocker et al. It was in powder form 45% passing a 400

Jan 1, 1973

By Francis T. Christy

One aspect of ocean mining that is frequently overlooked in discussions is the problem of establishing some form of legal control over the seas. Much of the discussion centers on mining in territorial waters, which are controlled by the various countries according to the Geneva Convention on the Continental Shelf, and perhaps by political subdivisions of countries such as the individual states of the U.S. But as technology improves and the mining of deeper waters becomes feasible, the problem of rights outside the continental shelf and territorial waters becomes a significant factor for anyone expending the time and capital for development. Several schemes are possible for regulating ocean mining but as yet none have been instituted, except what might be termed the "wait and see" approach. Even some of the coastal states in the U.S. have no regulations governing mining in the territorial waters under their jurisdiction. Until some regulation is formulated, there may well be little development in ocean mining due to the high risk of capital involved, both with respect to companies wishing to invest their own funds and financial institutions funding a venture to develop offshore mineral deposits.

Jan 7, 1968

URANIUM is commonly recovered by either column ion exchange (IX) or basket ion exchange (RIP) from solutions resulting from sulfuric acid leaching of uranium-bearing ores. In both operations a solid state ion exchanging resin is used, the major difference being that practically clear uranium pregnant solutions are required for passage through resin columns whereas in RIP, leach slurries from which only the sands have been removed are caused to flow through ion exchanging resins contained in baskets. The solvent extraction process as used for recovering uranium from acid leach solutions is also an ion exchanging process, but one in which the ion exchanging medium is a liquid rather than a solid state resin. For this reason, SX is often referred to as liquid ion exchange, although liquid- liquid extraction is probably more accurate. Uranium in its sulfuric acid leach solutions exists in an equilibrium that may be visualized as follows: [ ] Because of an equilibrium of this nature, uranium may be recovered on either cation exchanging or anion exchanging resins and then concentrated during the resin eluting operation. Similarly, solvent extraction processes may utilize either anion ex- changing or cation exchanging liquid organic phases, which capture the uranium and permit its subsequent concentration when the organic phase is stripped.

Jan 9, 1957

THE fall meeting of the Petroleum Division of the American Institute of Mining and Metallurgical Engineers will be held in Fort Worth on Oct. 19 and 20. The Texas Hotel will be headquarters. for this meeting, the technical sessions being held in the ball-room of the hotel. During the evening of the nineteenth a smoker will be held at the Fort Worth Club. In working out the program for this meeting, J. B. Umpleby, vice-chairman for production engineering, considered it especially desirable to offer as complete a discussion as possible of the subject of air-gas lift, its theory and practice, and its relationship to gas-oil ratios. The entire first day will be devoted to sessions on this subject. One session of the second day will be devoted to the use of electricity in oil-field operations and the second to the handling of congealing oils and paraffin. In addition to this program there will be one or more sessions when petroleum engineering research problems will be discussed. This meeting of the Division is primarily devoted to production engineering, as will be seen from the pro-gram. During one of the sessions, however, a brief review with forecasts of the production situation will be presented.

Jan 8, 1927

By C. Hosten, K. V. S. Sastry, D. J. Kawulok-Englund

Since the last decade the iron ore processing industry has undergone drastic changes from supplying screened and natural ores to manufacturing tailored concentrates and pellets. Increased need for the beneficiation of lower grade iron ore deposits and the increased demand for higher grade concentrates necessitate finer grinding of iron ores before concentration. The normal filtration stations used in the past are experiencing difficulties in dewatering the finely ground concentrates to moisture levels acceptable for balling. In addition to finer grinding, applications of complex beneficiation techniques has decreased the filterability of the concentrates and create problems in filtration of iron ore concentrates. An overview of the filtration literature indicates there are few research reports on the dewatering of iron ore concentrate slurries. There exists a need to understand the principles and mechanisms involved in the filtration of iron ore concentrate slurries with a goal of developing more efficient filtration techniques. This paper presents the results from the first phase of our research program that included the development of a reproducible benchscale filtration technique and the investigation of the filtration behavior of eight iron ore concentrates.

Jan 1, 1984

By Bernard York, John J. Reed

W. 0. Philbrook (Carnegie Institute of Technology, Phila.)—Mr. DeVaney's paper is a valuable addition to the growing technology of the magnetic roasting of lean iron ores. His furnace is ingeniously designed to permit close control of the process and to achieve high thermal efficiency by counter-current heat exchange and the withdrawal of both solid and gaseous products at relatively low temperatures. The principle of using a lean reducing gas to avoid over-reduction of the ore even at high operating temperatures (for rapid reaction rate) is thoroughly sound. The gas analyses and flow rates reported, however, are internally incon- sistent and render suspect any details of a heat balance based upon them. While it is entirely proper to consider the entrant gas as a reagent and to account only for the heat evolved by consuming a portion of the gas, many operators are accustomed to a heat balance using the total calorific value of the reagent supplied; and comparison of heat balances made with different bases of calculation can be quite misleading. Since Mr. DeVaney's paper is likely to be cited frequently in future discussions of magnetic roasting processes, it seems worth while to point out the internal discrepancies and to give alternate values of heat requirements for different bases of calculation.

Jan 1, 1954

By O. L. Culberson, J. J. McKetta

Experimental and smoothed data are presented for the solubility of methane in water for temperatures of 77, 100, 160. 220. 280, and 340°F at prejsures to 10.000 psia. The minimum solubility phenomenon exists within this temperature range to pressures of 10.000 psia. INTRODUCTION The study of hydrocarhon-water systems has been extended to the determination of the solubility of methane in water at pressures to 10.000 psia. The experimental apparatus, and the technique. are the same as that previously reported.' - In the determination of the solubility of methane in water, only two phases were present at temperatures between 100 and 340°F. these being the vapor phase and the water-rich. liquid phase. The determinations involved the agitation of methane and water in an equilibrium cell. withdrawal of a sample from the liquid phase, and the analysis of the sample. The experimental value; determined in this manner are pre9ented in Table I and in Fig. 1. Since experimental and analytical techniques have improved since the initial experiments with this equipment, it was decided to repeat the 77°F isotherm determinations.' Fig. I shows that the individual results for this isotherm are much

Jan 1, 1951

By John A. Church

The Lake Superior blast-furnaces probably represent the maximum economy of fuel possible in this country. They smelt an ore which is very rich and easily reducible, and as the small amount of gangue present is not all silica, but in part a silicate, the amount of limestone required is a minimum. The average yield of the ore treated at six furnaces was 63 per cent., and the average quantity of limestone 179 pounds per ton of pig. The fuel used is charcoal, so burned as to retain most of the combustible volatile part, which, before the utilization of furnace-gas, was burned away. With these conditions it is not surprising that the Lake Superior charcoal practice is extraordinary in almost every respect. In any scientific discussion of American furnace work, the establishments there will be found at the head of the list, and they work under conditions which are extremely favorable for careful study. The Bay Furnace, near Marquette, has the honor of carrying "the broom" for the largest daily make. With a capacity of 1908 cubic feet it has, for months together, produced 29 tons of pig, graded at

By J. J. McKetta, O. L. Culberson

Experimental and smoothed data are presented for the solubility of methane in water for temperatures of 77, 100, 160. 220. 280, and 340°F at prejsures to 10.000 psia. The minimum solubility phenomenon exists within this temperature range to pressures of 10.000 psia. INTRODUCTION The study of hydrocarhon-water systems has been extended to the determination of the solubility of methane in water at pressures to 10.000 psia. The experimental apparatus, and the technique. are the same as that previously reported.' - In the determination of the solubility of methane in water, only two phases were present at temperatures between 100 and 340°F. these being the vapor phase and the water-rich. liquid phase. The determinations involved the agitation of methane and water in an equilibrium cell. withdrawal of a sample from the liquid phase, and the analysis of the sample. The experimental value; determined in this manner are pre9ented in Table I and in Fig. 1. Since experimental and analytical techniques have improved since the initial experiments with this equipment, it was decided to repeat the 77°F isotherm determinations.' Fig. I shows that the individual results for this isotherm are much

Jan 1, 1951

By Myron Rodgers

IN rock- or ore-crushing tests all data, in order to be valuable for study and comparison, should be obtained and tabulated under conditions as uniform as possible. The results of many such tests have no value for comparison, because of incomplete data and the lack of uniform conditions, screens and scale of sizing, etc. The purpose of this paper is to suggest a form of standard specifications which may be developed by the Milling Committee and approved by the A. I. M. E. for rock-crushing tests. It is not intended to discuss any theories of rock crushing. Reports of rock-crushing tests should include the following details: 1. Description of the machine employed (jaw or gyratory crushers, rolls, stamps, tube mills, Chilean mills, etc.). 2. Method and material (timber, concrete, etc.) of foundation. Much power is dissipated in the vibration of poor foundations. 3. Locality from which the rock or ore was obtained, and geological, mineralogical, and physical characters of the material. 4. The power consumption of the machine running with no load and with full load, the unit of power being 1 hp, per 24 hr. 5. The capacity of the machine in tons (of 2000 lb.) per 24 hr. 6. The duty in tons per horsepower-day. 7. The screen analysis of feed and product by the proposed A. I. M. E. standard screen scale. On the foregoing statement, the following remarks are offered.

Jan 9, 1915

By Anders Carlson

NOTABLE advances have been made in the evaluation of oil-reservoir rocks from information furnished by core analysis. Among the physical data employed, per-meability is of primary importance. It may be assumed that the permeability of a core sample, considered as a property inherent to the nature of the porous medium only, is not markedly altered by the coring opera-tion, therefore some degree of accuracy is justified in the laboratory determination of permeability constants by means of homo-geneous flow media. To provide that such relatively simple determinations be sus-ceptible to duplication and consistent inter-pretation should prove advantageous in the prediction of subsurface flow conditions involving nonhomogeneous fluids. The air permeameter seems to fill most satisfactorily the need for rapid and fairly accurate determinations. Instruments that are similar in design and operation have come into general use. However, this has not resulted in an encouraging uniformity in the results obtained. Recognizing the value of reducing measured values to a common quantitative standard, the authors have sought to determine possible reasons for undue discrepancies and means for their elimination. This paper will be specifically concerned with three factors, which appear to be of some importance in the establishment of consistent permeability values: (I) design and operation of the permeameter, (2) preparation and mounting of the sample, (3) type of flow created in the sample.

Jan 1, 1940

Date of Congress: Sept. 20-25, 1915 The Committee on Local Affairs is fortunate in having secured for a period expiring on Oct. 17, an option. on 100 rooms at the Palace, St. Francis. and Fairmont hotels, the three leading hotels in San Francisco, with the distinct understanding that, on account of previous engagements whereby the hotels are reserved to their capacity, the rooms must be vacated on Sept. 25, 1915. The rates applying will be $7 per day for the court rooms occupied by two people, or $10 per clay for outside rooms occupied by two people. The outside rooms will face the main thoroughfares at the Palace and will face the city and bay at the Fairmont, which latter is situated oil a high hill. The St. Francis faces an open square and is flanked by main thoroughfares on two sides. If any members desire their reservation to extend either before the 20th or beyond the 25th, the Committee will use its best endeavors to secure such extension in individual cases, in accordance with the indicated wish. The Hotel Bureau in San Francisco is co-operating actively and closely with the. Committee on Local Affairs of the International Engineering Congress and offers the choicest rooms in any of 350 hotels other than the three mentioned above. This Hotel Bureau controls 50,000 rooms in San Francisco, which are all provided with hot and cold water, stationary basins, baths, house telephones, elevators, and bell boy service.

Jan 9, 1914

By M. A. Hunter

THIS paper gives the results of an investigation of the specific resistance and temperature coefficient of the electrical resistance of nickel and its important alloy, monel metal. For most of the pure metals, the temperature coefficient of resistance is approximately 0.0004 per degree centigrade at 2.0° C. Nickel and iron, however, are exceptions. This property is important as it gives us good material for the construction of thermometers and other instruments involving electrical control. A summary of information on this subject has been published by the Bureau of Standards.1 The present experiments antedate this publication by several years and as the information obtained is not contained in it, the results of the experiments are published as additional information. ELECTRICAL PROPERTIES OF PURE NICKEL It is generally conceded that the lowest values for electrical resistance are obtained in the purest metal. In the case of nickel, the best material obtainable is electrolytic nickel, which contains approximately. 99.80 per cent. nickel, 0.15 per cent. iron, and 0.05 per cent. copper. Any cobalt that may be present is included in the nickel figure. If the electrolytic sheet has been deposited without intermission, it is possible to cut a section from the sheet and roll it into wire without melting. By this means a nickel wire may be obtained that is uncontaminated by any of the impurities always taken up by nickel during melting.

Jan 5, 1922

By W. J. Babyak, F. N. Rhines

It has long been supposed that, regardless of the mechanism by which grain boundaries increase the hardness of a ductile metal, the effect should be linearly proportional to the grain boundary area. At the present time two methods for determining grain boundary area in an isotropic aggregate are available. The first, derived by Angus and Summers,' presumes that the grain boundary area is equal to 3vn, where n is the number of grains per sq mm in a random section through the metal. This estimate is based upon the assumption that the grains are equivalent to cubes whose faces correspond with the grains as observed in the micro-section. Measurements on copper, bronze, and a brass showed that a nearly linear relation exists between 3vn and hardness. This is illustrated, for the case of brass, in Fig. 1. The second method, developed independently by Smith and Guttman2 and by Duff in, Meussner, and Rhines,3 is absolute and employs a simple linear intercept count for measuring grain boundary area. It involves no assumptions with respect to the shape and distribution of the grain boundaries. The total surface in unit volume is 2 NL , where NL is the number of intercepts between grain boundary and unit length of a test line passed randomly through the sample. In practice, NL,, the average number of grain boundaries intercepted by unit length of traverse across a prepared microsection, is ob-

Jan 1, 1961

Mother Earth has had a long life extending over two billion years, during which time she has changed from a mass of incandescent gases to her present form, exhibiting a density stratification from the extremely tenuous gases of the stratosphere to the heavy central nickeliron core. Man is now mining all the principal divisions of Mother Earth except the centrosphere. Nitrogen, oxygen, neon, and other rarer gases are being recovered from the air; magnesium, bromium, potash, borates, and other salts from lakes and seas; brines, medicinal mineral waters, and great quantities of water for domestic and industrial uses from surface and subsurface reservoirs; and, from the rocky crust, many minerals and fuels for our present industrial civilization as well as plants and animals for food and shelter. Productivity of soil is influenced both positively and negatively by man. There is some cause to bewail what may be considered a wasteful influence of men on soil. The general situation is bad in spots but not hopeless. The passing of large areas of fertile land in some areas is merely to be noted and not to be mourned. These lands could not have been used without decrease in their fertility. The productivity factor is affected by human activities. Many soils in the eastern and southern states are far richer and more productive now than they were at any previous time. Arctic soils are not productive

Jan 1, 1950

By K. C. Lau

INTRODUCTION The design of engineering structures such as mine openings in and foundations on rock requires a knowledge of the constitutive laws governing the behaviour of discontinuous and layered rock masses. At the present time there are two main approaches for predicting the stress distributions and displacements in such engineering structures. In one method, the whole of the rock mass is discretized. The behaviour of the components of the rock mass, that is, the joints and the intact rock are modelled using analytical techniques such as the finite or boundary element methods. Typically the intact rock is modelled as a linear elastic material bounded by non-linear discontinuities. An alternative method of analysis is to describe the load-deformation properties of the jointed, layered or even reinforced rock mass in terms of smeared or equivalent homogeneous material properties. Such equivalent material properties may then be used to compute the stress distributions around openings and in foundations using standard methods of analysis such as the finite or boundary element techniques. Once the stresses have been obtained for the equivalent material, the stresses in the individual constituent layers or discontinuities may then be determined. Each approach to the problem has particular advantages. The first method is more likely to yield results which more closely represent the behaviour of the rock mass, since the behavioural responses of both the joints and intact rock are modelled. However, for many large or complicated geologic structures such an approach can become unweildy and uneconomical. In such cases, the equivalent

Jan 1, 1984

By H. R. Gardner

THE wide variation in tension and compression properties' which exist between the a,ß and ? phases of plutonium indicate that a study of the impact properties would give a greater insight into the variables affecting the mechanical properties and formability of plutonium. In tension the a phase is quite brittle with elongations less than 1 pct. The ß phase at normal test speeds is unusually ductile; elongations up to 621 pct have been obtained. However, the ß phase is quite sensitive to strain rate; elongations decrease rapidly as strain rate is increased. The y and 6 phases are less ductile than the ß phase, with the 5 phase the more ductile of the two. Neither are very sensitive to strain rate. Considering the brittle nature of a Pu in tension and compression and the strain rate sensitivity of ß -phase Pu, both unnotched Charpy specimens and standard V-notched Charpy specimens were fabricated for testing. In addition, since iron in amounts greater than 500 ppm forms a Pu-PlgFe eutectic network which inhibits microcracking in as-cast plutonium,' it was decided to prepare impact specimens with low and high iron contents. Chemical analysis and density data for the impact specimens are presented in Table I. A total of 55 impact specimens, 32 unnotched and 23 with the standard Charpy V-notch were tested at temperatures from —45' to 330°C. The test results for both unnotched and notched specimens are illustrated in Fig. 1.

Jan 1, 1962