Digital simulation of rock grinding process in ball mill.

Area of Science:

• Materials Science and Engineering
• Mechanical Engineering
• Computational Mechanics

Background:

• Grinding load motion modeling is crucial for determining dynamic parameters and energy consumption in rock destruction processes within mills.
• Accurate modeling impacts the efficiency and energy usage of various mill types.

Purpose of the Study:

• To create a digital physical model of a drum mill's grinding load.
• To incorporate the physical properties of grinding rock into the model.
• To enable process optimization using artificial intelligence.

Main Methods:

• Finite element method (FEM) simulations using LS-DYNA (Ansys).
• Model creation and visualization with Altair Hypermesh and LS-Prepost.
• Post-processing of results using ParaView.

Main Results:

• Investigated rock piece destruction via impact and abrasive actions, considering material properties.
• Developed a generalized model of rock destruction incorporating material properties, particle sizes, and fine fraction influences.
• Identified rock grinding speed as an optimization criterion for mill design and operation.

Conclusions:

• The generalized model provides dynamic insights into grinding load behavior.
• Optimizing mill design and operational parameters can be achieved by focusing on rock grinding speed.
• The study enables energy consumption optimization for the grinding process.