Quartz is a natural mineral. It is widely availalbe and has several important properties: high strength, resistance to destruction and high sorption capability. Quartz can be a part of other minerals, making its content in the planet’s crust above 60%. It is mostly used as sand in industrial applications.

Fine pulverization of minerals allows to change their adsorption capacity and intensify processes. Due to fine and superfine grinding, the material’s properties change.

Applications of quartz sand

Quatz sand is widely used. It is stable to chemical, mechanical and atmospheric factors and has good flowing properties. This material is used for:

• asphalt felt production;
• textured fininsh production;
• fire-proof material production;
• steel production;
• application on yards and lawns;
• production of casts for steel production;
• metal corrosion removal;
• paint production;
• filtration of drinkable water and industrial waste water;
• production of fine concrete and polymer concrete;
• production of glass and fiberglass.

Quartz sand production

Quartz sand can be produced either artificially or naturally. In the latter case, the material is taken from quarries, in the former case minerals are ground, refined and sieved.

While choosing a method of quartz pulverization, it should be remembered that each industry requires certain granule size, smoothness, color etc. For instance, decorative use in architecture requires smooth average and small size granules, while sanding requires jagged granules.

Jet mills are used for fine grounding of material up to 3 micron. The principle is of colloding two air jets carrying the material. The material is pulverized due to the collision impacts and friction.

Vibration mills are used for grinding of particles in the range of several millimiters to several micron. They consist of the grinding chamber with a vibration device inside. The rotation of the vibrator shaft causes the chamber to move on a circular path. The internal surface of the chamber and the external surface of the vibrator transfer this motion to the particles. Collisions of the particles create tension changing the structure of the material and promote its interaction with the medium filling the space in between. The main drawback of the vibration mill is the deterioration of the body due to wear along with grinding of the particles. This means that not only the equipment service life is reduced, but the material becomes contaminated by wear products.

Planetary mills perform fine and superfine pulverization of materials. The device consists of 3 or 4 drums, rotating relative to the central axes in the direction opposite to the rotor.

All advantages considered (high mean capacity, high energy and intensive pulverization) planetary mills also have drawbacks. The main issue is the scaling problem, high wear and their use mostly for wet grinding.

GlobeCore vortex layer devices

As an alternative to the above methods of quartz sand production, GlobeCore offers vortex layer devices, the AVS-100 and AVS-150 vortex layer devices. THe vortex layer is created by three phase electric power. The system resembles a cage motor without the rotor, with the active chamber in its stead. The chamber is filled with the material for processing, along with ferromagnetic pellets, which interact with the rotating EM field.

Chemical and physical processes in the vortex layer devices are intensified and accelerated due to the intensive disperion and mixing of the processed material, acoustic and electromagnetic influences, high local pressures, electrolysis and other factors. All of the above processes occur in the same chamber, in the same mode of operation.

The vortex layer devices can easily be integrated into existing process lines to improve product quality. Arranging connections accordingly (consecutively or parallel), just about any production rate can be achieved.

Tests indicate that pulverization of 200 grams of quartz sand to 1 micron only takes 2 minutes in the vortex layer. The size of the ferromagentic elements used was 3 mm, with the total particle load of 300 grams.