Mechanical Operations

Industrial crushers
Ball Mill
 Mechanical Operations

Contents
 Principle
 Construction
 Working
 Applications
 Advantages
 Equations governing the
operating speed
 Mechanical Operations
The operating principle of the ball mill consists of following steps.

• In a continuously operating ball mill, feed material fed through the

central hole one of the caps into the drum and moves there along,
being exposed by grinding media.

• The material grinding occurs during impact falling grinding balls and
abrasion the particles between the balls.

• Then, discharge of ground material made through the central hole in

the discharge cap or through the grid.
Mechanical Operations

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c2/Ball_mill.gif
Mechanical Operations
 Mechanical Operations
Construction
• Ball mill consist of a hollow cylindrical shell rotating about its axis.

• Axis of the shell horizontal or at small angle to the horizontal

• It is partially filled with balls made up of Steel, Stainless steel or rubber

• Inner surface of the shell is lined with abrasion resistant materials such as Manganese, Steel or rubber

• Length of the mill is approximately equal to its diameter

• Balls occupy about 30-50% of the volume. dia of the ball 12 mm-125 mm

• Shell is rotated through a drive gear (60-100 rpm) and large mills, shell might be in 3m in dia and 4.25 m in length.

• Operation may be batch or continuous, wet or dry…in a continuously operated ball mill outlet is normally covered
with coarse screen to prevent the escape of the balls..
 Mechanical Operations
Working of a conical ball mill:
• Material to be ground is fed from the left through a 60 cone and product is
discharged through a 30 cone to the right.

• As the shell rotates the balls are lifted up on the rising side of the shell and they
cascade down from near the top of the shell

• The solid particles in between balls are ground and reduced in size by impact.

• As the shell rotates the large balls segregate near the feed end and small balls
segregate near the product end

• If the rate of feed is increased, coarser product will be obtained and if the speed of
rotation is increased the fineness for a given capacity increases.
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• During grinding, balls themselves wear and are continuously replaced by new ones so
that mill contain balls of various ages and thus of various sizes.

• Ball mill produces 1 to 50 ton/hr of powder of which 70 to 90 % will pass through a

200 mesh screen and energy requirement of the ball mill is about 16 kwh/ton.

• In case of a batch operated mill a measured quantity of a solid to be ground is

charged to the mill through the opening in the shell.

• The opening is closed and the mill is rotated for several hours.

• It is then stopped and the product is discharged

 Mechanical Operations
Applications:
• The ball mill is used for grinding materials such as coal, pigments, and
feldspar for pottery.

• Grinding can be carried out in either wet or dry but the former is carried
out at low speeds.

• The advantages of wet grinding are less power consumption, increased

capacity, no dust formation etc…

• Dis advantages are high wear on the grinding medium and necessity to
dry the product
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Advantages of ball mill:
• The cost of installation is low
• The cost of Production is low
• It is suitable for materials of all degree of hardness
• The grinding Medium is cheap
• Used for the grinding of explosive materials
• Suitable for both batch &continuous operations
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Disadvantages
• Wear occurs, principally from the balls, but partially from the casing and this may
result in the product being contaminated.

• In some cases, this may not be significant, but in others it may be of great
importance.

• Soft or sticky materials may cause problems by covering on the sides of the mill.

• The ball mill is very noisy machine, particularly if the casing is of metal, but much
less so if rubber is used.

• Relatively long time of operation.

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Factors influencing on the size of product:
• Feed rate: With a high feed rate, less size reduction is effected since in this
case the material is in the mill for a shorter time.

• Properties of the feed material: With a hard material, a smaller size

reduction is achieved

• Level of the material in the mill: A low level of material in the mill results
into a reduction in the power consumption.

• if the level of material is raised power is wasted by the production of under

size material
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• Weight of the balls: With a heavy discharge of balls, we get a fine
product.
• We can increase the weight of the charge by increasing the number of
balls or by using a ball material of high density
• Speed & rotation of Ball mill: low speeds, the balls simply roll over one
another and little grinding is obtained while at very high speeds the balls
are carried along the walls of the shell and the mill is said to be
centrifuging.
• The minimum speed at which centrifuging occurs is called critical speed.
• In practice operating speed must be less than the critical speed.
 Mechanical Operations
Critical Speed of Ball Mill
Action in tumbling mills
• The load of balls in a ball mill is normally such that when the mill is stopped, the balls occupy
about one-half the volume of the mill.

• The void fraction in the mass of balls, when at rest, is typically 0.40.

• The grinding may be done with dry solids, but more commonly the feed is a suspension of the
particles in water.

• This increases both the capacity and the efficiency of the mill.

• Discharge openings at suitable positions control the liquid level in the mill, which should be such
that the suspension just fills the void space in the mass of balls.
 Mechanical Operations
• When the mill is rotated, the balls are picked up by the
mill wall and carried nearly to the top, where they
break contact with the wall and fall to the bottom to
be picked up again.

• Centrifugal force keeps the balls in contact with the

wall and with each other during the upward
movement.

• While in contact with the wall, the balls do some

grinding by slipping and rolling over each other, but
most of the grinding occurs at the zone of impact,
where the free-falling balls strike the bottom of the
mill.  
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• The faster the mill is rotated, the farther the balls are carried up inside the mill and
the greater the power consumption.

• The added power is profitably used because the higher the balls are when they are
released, the greater the impact at the bottom and the larger the productive
capacity of the mill.

• If the speed is too high, however, the balls are carried over and the mill is said to
be centrifuging.

• The speed at which centrifuging occurs is called the critical speed.

• Little or no grinding is done when a mill is centrifuging, and operating speeds must
be less than the critical.  
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• The speed at which the outermost balls lose contact with the wall of the mill
depends on the balance between gravitational and centrifugal forces.

• This can be shown with the help of Fig. Consider the ball at point A on the edge of
the mill.

• Let the radii of the mill and of the ball be R and r, respectively. The center of the
ball is, then (R – r) meters (or feet) from the axis of the mill.

• Let the radius AO form the angle  on with the vertical. Two forces act on the ball.

• The first is the force of gravity mg/gc. where m is the mass of the ball.
 Mechanical Operations
• The second is the centrifugal force mu2/gc (R — r) or m(R-r)2/gc, where  = 2n and
n is the rotational speed.

• The centripetal component of the force of gravity is (mg/gc)cos, and this force
opposes the centrifugal force.

• As long as the centrifugal force exceeds the centripetal force, the particle will not
break contact with the wall.

• As the angle ac decreases, however, the centripetal force increases, and unless the
speed exceeds the critical, a point is reached where the opposing forces are equal
and the particle is ready to fall away.

• The angle at which this occurs is found by equating the two forces, giving
 Mechanical Operations

  𝑢2
𝐶𝑜𝑠 𝛼 =
( 𝑅 −𝑟 ) 𝑔
The speed u is related to the speed of rotation
𝑢=2
  𝜋 𝑛( 𝑅 − 𝑟)
2
  𝛼 = [ 2 𝜋 𝑛( 𝑅 − 𝑟 )]
𝐶𝑜𝑠
( 𝑅 −𝑟 ) 𝑔

At critical speed,  = 0; cos = 1 and n becomes the critical speed c,

Then   1 𝑔
𝜂𝑐 =
2𝜋 √ 𝑅−𝑟
The ball mill runs at 65 to 80% of the critical speed with the lower values for wet grinding in viscous suspension.
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1. Find out the critical speed of ball mill by using the following data:
Diameter of the ball mill is 450mm and Diameter of the ball is 25 mm.

2. Calculate the operating speed of the ball mill from the given data
below Diameter of the ball mill is 800 mm and Diameter of the ball is
60 mm. if critical speed is 40% less than the operating speed.
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 Mechanical Operations
• If crushing rolls, 1 m in diameter, are set so that the crushing surfaces are 12.5 mm
apart and the angle of nip is 31◦, what is the maximum size of particle which should be
fed to the rolls? If the actual capacity of the machine is 12 per cent of the theoretical,
calculate the throughput in kg/s when running at 2.0 Hz if the working face of the rolls
is 0.4 m long and the bulk density of the feed is 2500kg/m3
Solution
• The particle size may be obtained from: cosα = (r1 +b)/(r1 +r2)
• In this case: 2α =31◦ and cosα =0.964, b= (12.5/2) = 6.25 mm or 0.00625 m
and: r1 = (1.0/2) =0.5 m
Thus: 0.964= (0.5+0.00625)/(0.5+r2)
and: r2 =0.025 m or 25 mm
The cross sectional area for flow= (0.0125×0.4)=0.005 m2
and the volumetric flowrate= (2.0×0.005)=0.010 m3/s.
Thus, the actual throughput= (0.010×12)/100=0.0012 m3/s or: (0.0012×2500)=3.0 kg/s
Mechanical Operations
Mechanical Operations
• Ball mill consist of a hollow cylindrical shell rotating about its axis. 
Axis of the shell horizontal or at small angle to the horizontal  It is
partially filled with balls made up of Steel,Stainless steel or rubber 
Inner surface of the shell is lined with abrasion resistant materials
such as Manganese,Steel or rubber  Length of the mill is
approximately equal to its diameter  Balls occupy about 30-50% of
the volume.dia of the ball 12 mm-125 mm  Shell is rotated through a
drive gear (60-100 rpm) and large mills, shell might be in 3m in dia
and 4.25 m in length.  Operation may be batch or continuous,wet or
dry…in a continuosly operated ball mill outlet is normally covered
with coarse screen to prevent the escape of the balls..