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Nevada Northern & Railroads of White Pine County
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Concentrate Storage Bin and Loader |
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BHP Copper North
America
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June Shaputis of Ruth, NV (http://www.webpanda.com) was kind enough to fulfill my request and both take and send these two photos of the storage bin/loader used to transfer the product of the BHP Robinson Mill -- copper concentrate -- to railroad hoppers for its journey to the smelter in San Manuel, AZ. Thanks also to Mike Cripps of Ely, NV, agent-emeritus of the BHP Nevada Railroad, for his kind hospitality and his willingness to share information and patiently answer my many questions. |
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The ore deposits in the open pit mines near Ruth, NV contain approximately 0.5% copper. Ore bodies are located by exploratory drilling and then blasted. The broken rock is hauled to the crusher and stockpiled. It then travels to the concentrator -- the processing plant -- where it is ground and subjected to chemical and column floatation processes and filtering. The end product from the mill is concentrate containing about 28% copper. |
The conveyor from the mill processing building to the concentrate storage bin and loader can be seen on the left in the above photo. Photographed Sept 1999.
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The concentrate is black with the consistency of finely ground flour. Presumably due to its high content of Cu, one can discern a slight dark green tinge under certain sunlight conditions. The concentrate has a density about 4-times greater than raw ore and also contains a high percentage of pyrite (iron). Because of its high density and the maximum limit of 95-97 tons per railroad car prescribed by the track conditions, hoppers are generally between 1/4 - 3/4 full, depending on their load limit and geometry. |
BHP Nevada Railroad motive
power (ex-Southern Pacific SD-9's) are stored on the concentrate loader
track in the Riepetown yard since the closing of the Robinson project
in the Summer of 1999.
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From the bin storage, the copper concentrate is moved across a belt scale and gravity fed into open hoppers. The cars are then pulled out to a dynamic scale to determine shipping weights before being moved to the "Sunshine Siding" for shipment north to the UP interchange at Shafter. |
Hopper cars on the
Sunshine siding 21 June 1999. The Sunshine dump is in the background.
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Last modified 18 August, 2001 -/- |
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