ABOUT THE BOOK

 

Discusses in detail the developments that have taken place in the minerals industry with regard to minerals quality.

 

It deals with the quality of run‑of mines (ROM) produce of minerals and how organizations world wide are trying to increase their quality output by adopting various management techniques and analytical procedures.

 

Both fuel and non‑f uel 'minerals have been discussed to provide as wide as possible treatment of various aspects of the quality of minerals.

 

 

THE AUTHOR

 

Dr Jayanta Bhattacharya is currently an Associate Professor in the Department of Mining Engineering at the Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur.

 

He has won a number of gold and silver medals as well as certificates of merit for his contributions in different fields of the mining industry.

 

He was also a fellow of the Japanese government in the field of reliability and quality.

 

He has so far published 20 review articles in international journals and is currently interested in industrial engineering and management ‑reliability, quality and environment control.

 

 

ALLIED PUBLISHERS LIMITED

 

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@ 2001, ALLIED PUBLISHERS LTD.‑

 

ISBN 81‑7764‑189‑1

 

Published by Sunil Sachdev and printed by Ravi Sachdev at Allied Publishers Limited (Printing Division), A‑104 Mayapuri, Phase 11, New Delhi ‑ 110 064 and typeset by Printo Graphic Systems, M‑66, Sriniwas Puri, New Delhi‑1 10 002 Ph.: 6847372.

 

Ackowledgements

 

The idea of this book came from two very successfully completed courses on quality control, popularly known as "Quality control in the minerals sector." The courses were so successful. because of excellent support provided to the author by the faculty and staff of the department. Notable mentions from the faculty arc Prof. S.C. Ray, Prof. S.D. Barve, Late Prof. B.B. Misra, Prof. B.S. Sastry, Prof. S.K. Mukhopadhyay, Prof. R.N. Modak, Prof. A. Bhattacherjee, Prof. S.K. Pal and Prof. K.U.M. Rao. From the staff of the department as well there was continuous encouragement. I single out, with due apologies, Mr. Hazra for his drafting work and Mr. S.K. De Sarkar for the typing work.

Some chapters were jointly prepared by myself and a number of my colleagues as their expertise was necessary. The example problems and solutions of the chapter on "Statistical Quality Control" was provided to me on request by Prof. S.K. Pal. The chapter on "Quality Circles" was jointly developed in consultation with Prof. K.U.M. Rao. The chapter on "ISO‑9000 series"was written Jointly with Prof. P.K. Ray of industrial engineering and management, 117, Kharagpur. The author wishes to put on record that without the help of the corresponding joint authors, those chapters would lose much of their richness.

If I could share any of the credit for carrying out this work I would have done so with my wife, Subrata and my daughter Madhusmita. They had to bear with my whims, stubborness and late night work towards completion of the work.

Finally, this work was carried out solely with the objective to inculcate a sense of quality in students and professionals associated with the minerals industry as 'quality' is paramount to the way we see, perform and select‑in other words the way we live. This book will be of special interest to those who are in the fields of mining engineering, metallurgical engineering and geological sciences. I would consider this humble effort of mine to be

Successful if this book in any way comes to their use.

 

Jayanta Bhattacharya

 

 

Preface

 

The field of quality and management is fast evolving, encompassing more and more all the aspects of organizational functions. While before the 1970s, quality control was only a branch or sectional function of quality inspectors and their team, quality management of the 1980s embraced the objective of incremental quality upgradation in total organizational functions. Total quality management as it 'is now comprehensively called, is also being further associated with benchmarking, reengineering and even to the context of compliance of environmental regulations, linking it together as total quality environmental management (TQEM). The genesis of such understanding stems from the fact that "quality" is associated with the waste of materials and energy­also essential prerequisites for pollution control. Also the drive for continuous improvement (CI) of organizatioaril functions is being pushed through with TQM as its mainstay.

The minerals industry was slow to wake up to the call of quality improvement because of its preponderance of 'quantity' before 'quality.' But it is changing as the corporations are fast beginning to understand that quality is where the markets of minerals are shifting.

Long term quality control poses a tremendous challenge to the minerals industry. The primary reason is that physical inspection of quality parameters, as it is done in the case of products of the manufacturing industry, is of little significance in case of mineral products. In mineral industries the 'quality' of a very small portion of a sample is determined on the basis of destructive testing and subsequent physical and chemical analyses‑which itself has high variability‑ to estimate the quality of the bulk. Again, while quality control and inspection is a job done prior to a manufactured product being released to the customers, for minerals the results of the analysis comes after the shipment has been made. These salient features of minerals 'quality' and many more pose challenges which the industry will have to strive to come to terms with.

The book tries to capture the developments that have taken place in the minerals industry with regard to minerals quality. It deals with the quality of run ‑of‑mines (ROM) produce of minerals (if directly supplied to the customer the produce will be called products) and how organisations world‑wide are trying to increase their quality output by adopting various management techniques, analytical procedures etc. The book is meant for teachers, students and professionals associated with the broad spectrum of production,laboratory, transportation, marketing and management functions of the industry. No distinction has been made in the treatment of different minerals as it was needed to bring in both fuel and non‑fuel minerals to provide as much a generalised treatment as possible of various aspects of minerals quality.

 

Jayanta Bhattacharya

 

 

Contents

 

Dedication                                                                                                                     V

Acknowledgement                                                                                                          Vii

Preface                                                                                                                         ix

 

1.         Quality and Its Relevance to Minerals Industries                                                   1

 

2.         Dilution and Ore Losses During Mining

            Operations‑Sources of Quality Loss                                                                     6

3.         Mineral Grade Quality Control‑Current

            Practices Worldwide                                                                                          15

4.         Sampling of Bulk Minerals                                                                                  23

 

5.         Periodic Minerals Quality Determination by Sample

Preparation and Assaying                                                                                   38

 

6.         On‑Stream Sampling Systems for Mineral

Processing Analyzers                                                                                        54

 

7.         Importance of Coal Quality Control in Power

Plants and Related Issues                                                                                  73

 

8.         Quality Determination, Control and Contracting

Procedures of Coking Coal                                                                                  80

 

9.         Mineral Grade Statistical Quality Control                                                               95

 

10.        TQM‑Philosophy                                                                                                128

 

11.        TQM ‑ Steps in Finding Important Issues, Features

            and Techniques and Solving Implementation

            Problems in Organizations                                                                                  143

12.        Fundamentals of ISO 9000 Series Quality System

            and Steps for Its Implementation                                                                          155

13.        Mining and Processing Practices and

            ISO 9000 Standards                                                                                           173

14.        Continuous Improvement                                                                                    191

15.        Computerized Quality Management System                                                         200

16.        Quality Circles‑A Concept of Progress

            Through Participation                                                                                          216

17.        Quality Management in Japanese Perspective                                                      244