Research on Wetting Process in the Flotation Operation

Research on the flotation process flow has never been ceased, especially on the wetting process in flotation machine operation.

Broadly speaking, after any fluid and solid (or liquid) contact, the immersion phenomenon after adherence and spread can be called wetting process. The result is that one fluid will be partly or wholly crowded out or be replaced by another fluid on the surface of wet material. Therefore, wetting phenomenon is a reversible physical process.

And technical experts of the flotation machine have carried out careful research on numerical changes of balanced contact angle, block rake and back angle to explain hydrophobicity covering membrane formed on the surface of solid by the blocking phenomenon and collecting agent molecules. And the long-term test shows: the contact angle will increase with the intensifying density of collecting agent molecules on solid surface until saturated; if the block front angle and back angle are not the same, the system has not yet been balanced.
In the analysis of flotation process, block front angle indicates the blocking effect when water supplants air and vice versa. Similarly, if we replace water drop with oil drop or bubble and soak it in the water, an identical phenomenon will be produced. The practical sense of the blocking effect can be identified when dispersive bubble and particles are adhered together.