Modeling and Simulation of Modern Industrial Screens using Discrete Element Method (TECHNICAL NOTE)

With progress in mineral processing technologies, particle size classification equipment has also been changed to satisfy the needs of modern plants. Accordingly, design, manufacturing and utilizing of banana screens in mineral processing plants have led to increased screening efficiency at industrial scale. Banana screen is an important invention occurred in past decade which increases screening capacity. These screens are made of several screening segments with different slopes. Despite of frequent use of banana screens in industry, their control and optimization has been limited due to lack of fundamental knowledge about the screening process. Using numerical simulation is an effective method to overcome such limitations in design and optimization studies. Discrete element method (DEM) is a numerical approach which computes particles interactions and their movements. In this paper, the results of modeling and simulation of particles movement and classification in banana screens using DEM method in PFC3D software environment is presented. Hence, DEM simulation of a three-segment banana screen was done to study the effect of design and operating variables on classification. To validate our DEM simulation, the results obtained in this study were compared with the previous results reported in literature. The comparisons show the correctness of authors DEM simulation.