Abstract for presentation at Chemeca 2007

Knowledge of the flow properties of a powder or a bulk solid is necessary to design silos and other bulk solid handling equipment. Much of the fundamental understanding of how bulk solids flow is related to results from the Jenike Cell shear tester results. However, the Jenike shear tester cannot be used on site to test the flowability of a powder, such as a fertiliser, before it is put into the hopper. The blow tester is a test that can be used on site. The Blow tester was developed as a method to measure the stickiness or caking that had occurred in powders. This paper compares the results from both Blow test and Jenike Cell shear tester obtained for a standard powder, copper concentrate, for which independent Jenike cell shear tester results were available for comparison. It was shown that the results from the shear tester compared very well with the reference results and that there were correlations between the Blow test results and the critical consolidation normal stress, the shear normal stress and the shear stress at failure, despite large error bands in the blow test results. Further work is required to see if the blow test results can be improved and to determine whether they can be related to hoper flow conditions.