FILTRATION OF BORAX SOLUTIONS THROUGH PERLITE

The use of perlite as a filter aid has been studied for the separation of tincal insolubles from borax solutions during the dissolution of t incal concentrate. Precoating and body-feeding techniques were applied with perlite/insolubles ratios ranging between 0-3 with filtration pr essures ranging between 2 and 4 bar. Lower specific cake resistances o f the order 1 x 10(10) m kg-1 were obtained for the body-feeding techn ique. Incompressible cakes were obtained with compressiblity coefficie nts of c. 0.016. The specific cake resistance was found to increase wi th the bulk density of the perlite grade.