What are the differences between dry magnetic separator and wet magnetic separator?

Technical comparison between dry magnetic separator and wet magnetic separator

1. Sorting medium and working principle

Dry magnetic separator uses air as the sorting medium and directly acts on dry minerals through a high-intensity magnetic field. Its core advantage is that it does not require water, which is particularly suitable for arid areas or water-sensitive material processing. Typical equipment such as permanent magnetic drum dry separators can have a magnetic field strength of up to 15,000 gauss, but have strict requirements on the moisture content of the material (needed to be <3%).

Wet magnetic separators use slurry fluid to achieve sorting, and the presence of water makes fine particles (-0.074mm) easier to capture. The sorting process includes three stages: magnetic particle adsorption → non-magnetic particle washing → concentrate stripping. The latest wet machine model has achieved pulse water pressure regulation, which has increased the recovery rate of weakly magnetic minerals such as ilmenite to 85%.

2. Comparison of application scenarios

Application scenarios of dry equipment

Primary selection of iron ore in water-scarce areas (processing capacity can reach 200t/h)

Iron recovery in construction waste (sorting purity > 90%)

Iron removal from high-sulfur coal (avoiding secondary pollution caused by water medium)

Advantages of wet equipment

Selection of rare metals such as tantalum-niobium ore (lower particle size limit 0.01mm)

Deep iron removal from quartz sand (Fe₂O₃ content can be reduced to 0.01%)

Pretreatment before reverse flotation of hematite