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Int. J. Miner. Process. 86 (2008) 114 130

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Raking in gravity thickeners

M. Rudman a,, K. Simic b , D.A. Paterson c , P. Strode b , A. Brent b , I.D. utalo c
b

a
CSIRO Mathematical and Information Sciences, Private Bag 33, Clayton South, Victoria 3169 Australia
AJ Parker CRC for Integrated Hydrometallurgy Solutions, CSIRO Minerals, Bayview Rd Clayton, VIC 3169, Australia
c
CSIRO Materials Science and Engineering, PO Box 56 Highett, Victoria 3190 Australia

Received 18 December 2006; accepted 25 December 2007

Available online 10 January 2008

Abstract
Thickener rakes are essential in the transport of sediment bed material to the underflow in conventional thickeners, however
very few studies of bed transport have been published. In this paper, results from pilot-scale thickener experiments with tailor-made
yield stress slurries are presented and compared to companion Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) simulations. Rake torque is a
key issue in thickener operation and it was found that the yield stress of the suspension is the major factor in determining rake
torque. Over a range of rake speeds, the measured torque was an almost linear function of yield stress. CFD simulations of the
experiments allowed torque to be estimated, and results are shown to be within 20% of the measured values in all cases except the
lowest (zero) yield stress suspension. Residence time distributions of solids in the bed were also measured and unusual results were
found in which the relationship between residence time and distance from the underflow is not linear (or even monotonic). CFD
results clearly show that for uniform sized rake blades, the over-delivery of an outer blade (compared to the next inner blade) sets
up recirculation in the bed, especially in the outer regions of the tank, and this can result in long material pathways and hence long
residence times. This picture is further complicated by the relative contributions of rake delivery and underflow rate, and indicates
that a simple picture of plug flow in the bed is far from reality. The study illustrates the value that can be obtained from validated
CFD modelling of thickener rakes.
Crown Copyright 2008 Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
Keywords: Gravity thickening; Raking; Transport; Dewatering; Modelling

1. Introduction
A common way to separate solids from liquids for high
volume applications is to utilise settling under the influence
of gravity in large tanks, typically termed clarifiers,
washers, or thickeners depending on the intended purpose
of the separation step. In order to effect faster settling,
flocculant is often added to the feed slurry and the sediment
Corresponding author. Tel.: +61 3 9545 8093; fax: +61 3 9545
8080.
E-mail address: Murray.Rudman@csiro.au (M. Rudman).

that forms is often of a thick consistency with high viscosity and a yield stress. The term conventional thickener refers to those tanks with a shallow base slope and a
relatively shallow depth of sediment, and is the type of
equipment that is the focus of this study. Material that
settles in a conventional thickener moves towards the
discharge partly under the action of gravity and by
mechanical transport using rakes.
Thickener rakes fulfil three main functions: 1) to move
sediment to the underflow, 2) to assist in dewatering
sediment that settles onto the thickener bed and 3) to
scrape deposits away from the base, and sometimes the

0301-7516/$ - see front matter. Crown Copyright 2008 Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.minpro.2007.12.002

M. Rudman et al. / Int. J. Miner. Process. 86 (2008) 114130

walls, of the tank. It is the first of these functions that is the

focus of this paper. Although thickener rakes are essential
in the transport of bed material to the underflow in conventional thickener designs, and effective rake design and
operation can reduce the likelihood of rat-holing, little is
known about transport due to rake action in thickeners.
The literature describing raking consists of just a handful
of previous studies.
Based on measurements made on full-scale thickeners,
Gnthert (1984) found that increasing either blade
velocity or blade height would improve raking and
movement of bed material to the underflow. Warden
(1981) and Albertson and Okey (1992) developed single
equation mathematical models for spiral rake blades to
investigate transport. Warden modelled the effect of a set
of rake blades by approximating them as a continuous
spiral. The validity of this approach is questionable, given
that the pressure gradient along a rake blade between the
upstream and downstream ends of individual blades is
very different to that along the length of a spiral rake. The
equations developed by Albertson and Okey (1992) had
empirical constants that had to be determined experimentally or estimated mathematically, thus making general
application difficult. Neither of these models takes the
non-Newtonian nature of the bed into account and neither
is able to provide details of the flow patterns that are
generated by the rakes. Most of these studies have been
related to the wastewater treatment industry, whereas our
focus here is on conventional thickeners that are used
widely in minerals processing applications.
The only papers published to date that have sought to
study the transport of bed material to the underflow during
raking in thickeners have been the works of Frost et al.
(1993), Szalai et al. (1994) and utalo et al. (2003). Frost
et al. (1993) used a three-dimensional Computational
Fluid Dynamics (CFD) model to predict the flow through
a circular flat-bottomed wastewater thickener, with an
emphasis on showing how raking efficiency was affected
as blade angle and sizes were modified. They found that
the efficiency increased as the blade height and length
were increased and that the optimal blade angle was
between 20 and 30. They did not show global transport
patterns for their simulations. Szalai et al. (1994) used a
two-dimensional CFD model (with a third, swirl
component of velocity) to predict the liquid-only flow
in a circular clarifier of conventional design and attempted
to model the effect of the rake mechanism by artificially
inducing swirl at the bottom of the thickener. Although
they showed global transport patterns, the results did not
agree with measured data. They stated that CFD modelling should include the rakes and therefore a three-dimensional model would be required.

115

In the most complete study of raking to date, utalo

et al. (2003) combined CFD and small-scale experimental
modelling in which an optically clear polymer gel was
used to simulate a thickener sediment bed. They used flow
visualisation and measured velocity fields using Particle
Image Velocimetry (PIV). The work showed that rake
blades suck material behind them as well as pushing
material in front of them toward the underflow. It was also
clearly shown that the overall transport of material from
the periphery of the thickener to the underflow occurred at
the level of the rake blades and appeared as a spiral pattern
that took one or more revolutions to traverse the distance
from the tank periphery to the underflow. This pattern was
generated by many rake passes. A comparison between
the experimental velocity measurements and CFD predictions for individual rake components was good, suggesting that the CFD model developed there could be used
with some confidence to predict transport in operating
thickeners. No CFD simulations of global transport were
presented in that study.
In conventional thickeners, it is common for rake
blades to be a uniform size along the rake arm. Warden
(1981) first stated that this configuration will lead to a
mismatch in delivery between neighbouring blades and an
over-raking of the bed at the periphery of the tank when
sufficient material is being delivered to the underflow. The
small-scale experimental results of utalo et al. (2003)
show that this over-raking at the periphery results in dyed
material being segmented by rake passage, with material
that flows below the arm being moved inward and material
that flows above the arm moved outward. Together with
CFD predictions, they showed that there is significant
recirculation due to the mismatch in blade delivery.
A major uncertainty in the experimental results of
utalo et al. (2003) is the validity of using aqueous
polymer gels to model dense, flocculated fine particle
suspensions that are found in minerals processing applications. Another is the ability of the CFD model developed
there to accurately predict global transport of the bed. In the
present paper, experimental results from a 2 m diameter
pilot-scale thickener in which flocculated, fine particle
thickener underflows are used to approximate a thickener
bed. Specifically, torque measurements and residence time
distributions measured using an optical tracer are compared to results obtained from a CFD model based on that
reported in utalo et al. (2003). Because the bed in the
present study is opaque and it is not possible to see what is
happening in the pilot unit, the CFD model allows an
understanding of this complex flow to be gained that
would be difficult to infer from the pilot-scale results alone.
The paper is organised as follows: In Section 2 a
description of the pilot-scale thickener process circuit

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M. Rudman et al. / Int. J. Miner. Process. 86 (2008) 114130

and measurement techniques is presented. A brief

outline of the CFD model is provided in Section 3.
Rake torque measurements are presented in Section 4
and compared to data extracted from CFD simulations
of the pilot-scale runs. Residence time results and
companion CFD predictions that explain them are given
in Section 5. Finally, summary and conclusions are
presented in Section 6.
2. Experimental techniques
2.1. Pilot-scale thickener circuit
The pilot-scale thickener facility used in this study is a
closed loop system and is shown schematically in Fig. 1.
A sample of slurry is mixed continuously in a 4.5 m3
mixing tank, and pumped out of the mixing tank
underflow into the pilot thickener. The thickener tank is
a 2 m diameter by 2 m high side wall tank with a 14 floor
and a small discharge hopper (45 slope). This thickener
is not used as a sedimentation and dewatering tank in the
experiments reported here and instead plays the role of a
through-flow holding tank in which the raking experiments are undertaken. The slurry is distributed into the
thickener uniformly across a radius via a manifold
comprising of four equi-spaced 19 mm nozzles. Underflow from the pilot thickener is fed back into the mixing
tank. An on-board PID program in the variable frequency
drive uses a feedback signal from the ultrasonic level
sensor (Milltronics) to maintain a stable slurry height in

the thickener. The slurry level in the mixing tank was

dictated by the requirement that an appropriate level of
slurry must cover the impellor to ensure good mixing.
Underflow was regulated by a PID loop (ABB Model
ACS400) and flow meter (Danfoss DN25) combination.
Other variables monitored on the underflow include
density and temperature.
Once steady slurry height and underflow conditions
were attained in the thickener tank, the rake was turned
on. The rake is mounted on a central shaft that is driven by a motor and gearbox at speeds between 0.2 and
2 rpm. The tip speed of the outer blade at 1 rpm corresponds to the same tip speed as that in a 40 m thickener
operating at a rake speed of 3 rev h 1 (20 min rev 1).
AVFD (Sumitomo NTAC-2000) was used to control the
rake speed either by manual setting or by utilising the
on-board programming capabilities.
2.2. Rake arm and rake blade design
The rake arms are made from slotted rectangular
section plate and the blades are bolted to the arm at the
desired positions and angles. This allows rapid changes
to be made to the number of blades, the blade spacing,
angle of attack and type/size of blades (see Fig. 2a). For
the conventional rake studies here, five blades were used
and were mounted at 30 from the direction normal to
the arm (see Fig. 2b).
For most tests, the blades were a uniform size at
290 75 mm and it is noted that the radial position of the

Fig. 1. Schematic of the pilot-scale thickener flow circuit used during the rake investigation studies.

M. Rudman et al. / Int. J. Miner. Process. 86 (2008) 114130

117

Fig. 2. (a) Slotted rake arm system demonstrating easy blade positioning and blade angle setting and (b) schematic of rake configuration used in the
tests.

trailing edge of one blade matches the radial position of

the leading edge of the next (i.e. there was no blade
overlap). For a few runs, blades that were 50% taller
(290 112 mm) were used and a single 75 mm high
paddle blade that ran parallel to the rake arm was also
used in a few cases the latter approximates the case of
a rake that has been completely scaled-up as it occurs
frequently in minerals processing applications. The rake
arms were attached to a common hub that was secured to
the rake shaft by a taper lock arrangement.
2.3. Torque measurement
The rake shaft is of hollow construction to allow direct
measurement of torque using a TorqueTrak 9000 Digital
telemetry system (Binsfeld Engineering). A full Wheatstone Bridge strain gauge mounted to measure torque on a
rake shaft was connected to a battery powered radio
transmitter. Strain data is transmitted to a radio receiver and
the receiver outputs this data as a 10 V signal suitable for
a standard data logging system. Prior to any experiment
being conducted, the measurement system was zeroed with
the rake shaft stationary and the arms and thickener clear of

any fluid. For this work, the highest gain setting of 8000
was selected to ensure the most sensitive measurements.
The relationship between torsional strain, , and
torque, T (Nm), for a hollow rotating shaft is described
mathematically by:
e

16; 000DO 1 m


T
p D4O  D4I E

where DO and DI are the outer and inner diameter of the

shaft respectively (mm) and the material properties of the
shaft are described with E, the modulus of elasticity (N
mm 2) and , the Poisson ratio (dimensionless). Based on
predicted torque loadings, a hollow stainless steel shaft
with 2.45 mm thick wall and outer diameter of 75.45 mm
was chosen and was suitable for all measurements made
in this study. The rake shaft is 2 m long with the lower end
sealed with a welded end cap and the other end flanged for
bolting to the gearbox output shaft.
Measured torque results have a random local variation
with a standard deviation of about 1.3 Nm over one rake
rotation and these are averaged out. In addition, a repeat of
an identical rake geometry and slurry showed a variation

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M. Rudman et al. / Int. J. Miner. Process. 86 (2008) 114130

of about 3.5 Nm (12.5%) for a temperature variation

of 3.5 C, possibly as a result of instrument drift. The
pilot thickener was out in the open and subject to ambient
conditions that varied, so the measured torque results
presented in this paper have been averaged and corrected
for instrument drift.
2.4. Solids tracer technique
X-ray diffraction analysis (XRD) revealed that the
solids component of the feed slurry contains a significant
proportion of kaolinite that is known to strongly adsorb a
range of commercially available dyes. Consequently, an
optical technique was chosen to measure solids residence
time distributions using a reflectance spectrometer (GretagMacBeth, ColorEye XTH). After trials, the dye chosen
was Azure A because it required less dye to saturate the
kaolinite and the colour response was more intense than
alternatives. Dyed material was rheologically indistinguishable from un-dyed material and provided sufficient
contrast at low concentrations for good detection.
A saturated solids tracer slurry was prepared by mixing
2 g of Azure A with 1 kg of feed slurry (solids content
11.3 wt.%) for 10 min. By adding this dyed tracer
incrementally to untreated slurry and measuring the response with a reflectance spectrometer, a calibration curve
was determined using the KubelkaMunk theory of reflectance (Kubelka and Munk, 1931). The most sensitive
light wavelength for this system was determined to be
540 nm and this was the wavelength at which measurements were made. Denoting the reflectance at 540 nm as a
function of tracer concentration as R(c), define the K/S
value as a function of c, using
K=S

1  Rc2 1  R02

2  Rc
2  R0

Plotting K/S as a function of dyed tracer concentration

(Fig. 3) allows the solids concentration to be calculated as
Solids tracer wt:k

K=S  0:0297
0:2716

For the pilot-scale tests, 20 kg dyed tracer batches were

made up by adding 2 g of Azure A per kilogram of slurry
and then mixing thoroughly to ensure a uniform coverage
of all particles in the sample. Residence time tests were
performed by pumping a known mass of tracer through a
12 mm ID stainless steel tube into the slurry bed. Once the
tracer had been delivered, the tracer delivery pump was
turned off, the addition lance withdrawn and the rake and
thickener underflow pumps were started simultaneously.
If the location of tracer addition was in the volume swept

Fig. 3. The K/S value (absorbance/scatter) as a function of the solids

tracer concentration.

by the rake, the mass of tracer added was generally in the

range from 0.51 kg, whereas outside of this volume the
mass added was between 12 kg. The greater mass of
tracer was added in anticipation that there would be
greater dispersion of this material by the time it appeared
in the underflow. Note that slurry is re-circulated in a
closed loop fashion in the pilot thickener system and
consequently any tracer that appeared in the underflow
was diluted to below detection levels in the mixing tank
before being transferred back into the pilot thickener.
2.5. Slurry preparation and characterisation
All pilot-scale experiments were undertaken at a sand
mining operation, with the clay-based feed to the pilotscale thickener circuit being drawn from the underflow of
the plant tailings thickener. The initial feed to this tailings
thickener was all sub 100 m. To modify the rheology of
this material, quantities of attapulgite clay were incrementally added to the slurry and mixed until homogeneous. A Haake VT550 rheometer was used with a
cruciform vane to measure the static yield stress and a cup
and bob (MV-DIN) was used to measure rheograms
(shear stress as a function of shear rate). All measurements
were performed at ambient temperature conditions. The
rheograms are shown in Fig. 4. The rheology is shearthinning and there is little evidence of thixotropy.
A HerschelBulkley (HB) rheology model was
fitted to the rheograms,
:
s sy j g n
4
where is the total stress, y is the yield stress, is the
:
consistency, g is the strain rate and n is the flow index.
Note that y, and n are model fitting parameters and
do not have a physical significance of themselves, hence
the vane yield stress and fitted HB yield stress usually
take different values (although they are similar in
magnitude). Note that the model fit values are those that

M. Rudman et al. / Int. J. Miner. Process. 86 (2008) 114130

119

Fig. 4. Rheograms of shear stress versus strain rate for the six slurries.

were subsequently used in the CFD modelling. The

solids content of each slurry was calculated by drying
samples. Table 1 summarises the material properties of
the slurries used in the pilot thickener raking studies.
The dependence of static yield stress on solids content
is typical of mineral slurries, with little variation at low
solids and, at higher solids concentration, quite large
increases in yield stress with small variations in solids
content. The range of static yield stress (0132 Pa) is
representative of typical slurry yield stresses encountered in the minerals processing industry.
3. CFD modelling
The CFD model solves the primitive variable forms of
the equations for conservation of mass and momentum in
an Eulerian framework with values stored at the corners
of an unstructured tetrahedral mesh. The simulations
were carried out using the commercial code CFX 5.4
which uses a finite volume discretisation with the Rhie
Chow algorithm for pressure calculation. Simulation
Table 1
Slurries used in the raking studies
Slurry %
Density Composition
no.
solids (kg m 3)

1
2
3
4
5
6

11.9
18.2
30.6
34.4
37.8
41.4

1080
1122
1240
1272
1310
1345

Vane Herschel
yield Bulkley
stress parameters
(Pa)
y
n

Diluted UF
0
UF
7.5
UF + 12.4 wt.% 16
UF + 16.2 wt.% 33
UF + 19.6 wt.% 57
UF + 23.2 wt.% 132

0 1.2
4 3.2
16 0.7
28 0.56
48 0.6
95 10

0.27
0.25
0.5
0.6
0.6
0.6

UF refers to undiluted underflow from the tailings thickener that was

used as the base slurry, and the percentage in the composition column
is the wt.% of added attapulgite.

meshes contain 1.2 to 1.7 million nodes except for the

paddle blades which only needed 0.75 million. The
CFX proprietary higher order upwind differencing
scheme is used for the mass and momentum equations.
User CEL expression language was used for programming the HerschelBulkley rheology model, the inflow
conditions and certain aspects of the rotating flow. Other
key aspects of the model are:
1. The simulation is performed in a rotating coordinate
frame attached to the rake. In this frame, the geometry
is stationary (although the tank walls and cone
rotates), making the simulation simpler to undertake.
2. The bed material is assumed homogeneous (as in the
pilot-scale experiments) and no dewatering is included
in the model.
3. The HerschelBulkley rheology parameters measured during the pilot-scale experiments are used in
the simulation.
4. The inflow is based on unreported CFD simulations of
the exit flow from a full-scale thickener feedwell. It is
set to be a smooth function of radius with a flow rate
that is distributed in a hyperbolic fashion around the
circumference. It also approximates the pilot-scale
slurry feed system.
Several Eulerian techniques for calculating residence
time distributions were trialled, although the results were
generally unsatisfactory due to numerical diffusion. A
Lagrangian approached was then developed in which
streamlines were calculated from the steady velocity field
in a post-processing step. It is not possible to calculate
streamlines by simply subtracting the rotation from the
velocity field first (to move into a stationary coordinate
frame) because in the stationary frame the rake (and hence
computational geometry) is changing with time. To

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M. Rudman et al. / Int. J. Miner. Process. 86 (2008) 114130

Fig. 5. The arrangement of the pilot-scale thickener CFD model showing the rake layouts for (a) paddle blade, (b) 5-blade rake and (c) detail of the
mesh for the 5-blade rake. The taller rake blades have the similar layout as the geometry in the middle.

perform the streamline calculations in the stationary frame

would thus turn a steady problem into an unsteady one
and would require vast amounts of unnecessary interpolation and additional error. Hence the following
procedure was developed:
1. Velocity output files were read into the Tecplot 10
software and for each RTD, 125 streamlines were

calculated in the rotating coordinate frame (in which the

geometry is steady). The streamline starting positions
were uniformly distributed in a (5 5 5) cm3 box.
2. There is no timing information available from step 1,
hence an integration program was written that integrated
along a streamline from the start position, estimating the
distance travelled and the mean speed between
subsequent points on the streamline. This was then

M. Rudman et al. / Int. J. Miner. Process. 86 (2008) 114130

used to estimate a time increment between points on the

streamline.
3. For each streamline, the time increment was added to
the total elapsed time along that streamline, and the
streamline position was rotated through an angle
calculated as the product of the total elapsed time and
the rotational speed of the coordinate frame. The
resulting streamline is then the streamline as it would
appear in the stationary frame (i.e. the one in which the
rake is rotating).
The raking geometries modelled are shown in Fig. 5a,
b. The top of the bed is taken to be 0.6 m above the top
edge of the cone, which is an average figure for the height
in the pilot-scale studies (which varied between runs).
This is well above the top of the rakes and any small
discrepancies in the height will not affect the raking
behaviour. Fig. 5c shows details of the unstructured
surface mesh used around the inner portion of the rake.
Mesh refinement studies are an important part of all
CFD modelling. Due to the complexity of the geometries
used here, a mesh refinement study of the complete pilotscale thickener geometry was not undertaken. Instead
simulations were performed for the flow around individual rake blade/arm elements and an assessment made of
the mesh resolution required to obtain converged results
in terms of predicted forces on the blade/arm surfaces.
Results showed that provided a blade contained approximately 12 40 elements, and that there was a concentration of elements at the edges of the blades, predicted lift
and drag forces changed by less than 2% for increased
resolution. This resolution was used or exceeded in the
calculations undertaken here and special care was taken
with mesh generation to provide high resolution around
the raking structure without jeopardising the resolution
in the bulk of the fluid. The meshes are consequently

121

considered to be fine enough to reliably model the flow

pattern in the tank and to estimate rake torques.
4. Rake torque results
During commissioning of the circuit, it was established that a minimum slurry height of 200 mm above
the cone was required before slurry depth did not
influence torque measurements (this corresponds to a
slurry depth above the rakes at the tank periphery of
approximately 100 mm). Consequently during the
experiments, the depth of slurry in the thickener was
kept in the range 0.40.9 m above the cone. For most of
these runs the underflow rate was 3.0 m3 h 1 except for
the highest yield stress slurry, where the underflow was
reduced to 2.5 m3 h 1 due to pumping difficulties. For
comparison, the volume swept by the two (75 mm high)
inner rake blades of this system is equal to approximately 2 m3 h 1 at a rake speed of 1 rpm. Depending on
how much of this volume is actually moved inward
by the rake (as opposed to being swept circumferentially) the tank is probably over-raked at a rake speed of
2 rpm, and under-raked at a rake speed of 0.2 rpm,
with the possibility of rat-holing in the latter case. In
unreported experiments the underflow withdrawal rate
was not seen to affect torque.
4.1. Measured torque
Torque measurements showed evidence of random
noise, cyclic behaviour related to the rake orientation, and
drift with time, the latter showing some correlation with
temperature even though the strain gauges are fully temperature compensated. Because of the random and cyclic
variations the mean torque was averaged over multiple
rotations, from 10 revolutions for the lowest speed

Fig. 6. Pilot-scale measurements of the effect of rake speed and slurry rheology on rake torque for the standard 30 blade rake (solid lines).
Computational results discussed in Section 4.2 are shown as the dashed lines.

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M. Rudman et al. / Int. J. Miner. Process. 86 (2008) 114130

Fig. 7. Rake torque as a function of vane yield stress for all slurry types tested, with the line of best fit.

(0.2 rpm) up to 170 revolutions for the highest speed

(2 rpm). The mean drift over time was corrected by
examining the drift in the single-revolution averages and
subtracting the trend.
Two key parameters of interest in this study are the
effect of yield stress on rake torque and the effect of
rake speed. Fig. 6 shows the effect of rake speed on
torque for the 5-blade rake in the different slurries
(experimental results are the solid lines). The largest
increase in torque generally occurred when the speed
was increased from 0.2 to 0.5 rpm (especially in Slurry
No. 5 and 6), although this is not clear from the figure
because of the log scale. At rake speeds greater than
0.5 rpm, torque increased only slightly with speed for all
slurry rheologies. Anecdotal evidence from operating
thickeners agrees with this lack of sensitivity of torque to
rake speed, and indicates that the major component of
rake torque is generated overcoming the slurry yield
stress. This is most readily explained by referring to the
rheograms shown in Fig. 4. As the rotation rate increases,
the strain rate increases, and this changes the shear stress
in line with changes in Fig. 4. When integrated out over
the surfaces of the raking structure the yield stress con-

tributes strongly to the torque. Thus the torque versus

rotation rate curves resemble the rheology curves, with
larger increases at low rake speeds and smaller increases
as the rake speed increases. Of course this behaviour
depends strongly on the slurry properties and would not
be seen in a Newtonian slurry. If all the rake torque values
shown in Fig. 6 are plotted as a function of yield stress, an
almost straight line results (Fig. 7). This figure shows that
rake torque increases linearly with yield stress almost
regardless of rake speed. This dependence suggests that
yield stress measurements may be used to obtain a
reasonable prediction of the likely torque for a thickener
rake, provided a suitable relationship can be determined
for the given configuration. The results also suggest that
the measured rake torque can be used to back-calculate a
direct estimate of the bed yield stress, again provided this
linear relationship is known. As will be seen later, CFD
offers a practical way of determining the relationship.
In Frost et al. (1993) and utalo et al. (2003), taller rake
blades were claimed to provide better rake efficiency, and
torque measurements here for the 290 112 mm rake
blades are compared to the 290 75 mm blades in Fig. 8
(for slurry #4, 33 Pa yield stress). Over the whole range of

Fig. 8. Effect of blade height on rake torque for a 5-blade rake in Slurry #4 (see Table 1 for material properties).

M. Rudman et al. / Int. J. Miner. Process. 86 (2008) 114130

123

Fig. 9. Comparison of straight paddle and 5-bladed rake for slurry #4 (33 Pa vane yield stress).

rotation rates the larger blade generated approximately

60% higher torque. The additional torque for tall blades is
slightly more than the increase in blade size (50%), hence
the additional efficiency of the tall blades comes at a
disproportionate cost in required torque. One potential
benefit with higher blades is that for a given rake speed,
they deliver more material than smaller blades and will
decrease the likelihood of rat-holing. Alternatively, taller
blades could be used in a staggered blade arrangement
in which alternate blades on opposite arms are removed,
reducing the total blade area and torque while maintaining
satisfactory rake delivery to the underflow. Although not
trialled here, staggered blades were used to good effect in
small-scale modelling presented in utalo et al. (2003).
Fig. 9 shows the variation of torque with rake speed for
a paddle blade compared to the standard 5-blade rake for
slurry #4 (33 Pa yield stress). The projected area of the
paddle blade is marginally greater (2%) than that of the
standard 5-blade arm. The level of drift correction
required for the paddle blade design are of the order of
15% or higher, and consequently the results for the paddle
blade are not as reliable as the other rakes considered here
that required only 25% corrections. For the paddle blade,
the torque remains at an almost constant level that is
approximately 1015% higher than for the 5-blade rake
(possibly within experimental error in this case). However
there is very little transport of material to the underflow
with the paddle blade (see discussion in Section 5). The
only benefit in practice of using a paddle blade (or keeping
a scaled rake in operation) is a reduction in the likelihood
of scale build-up on the thickener floor due to the repeated
shearing of the sediment. The generally similar level of
torque between the two raking systems suggests that
projected area is also a key determinant in the level of rake
torque (a conclusion also supported by the results shown
in Fig. 8). Note that the variation in torque in Fig. 9 both
between, and within, rake designs is within the scatter
seen in Fig. 7.

4.2. Computed torque

Rake torque can be estimated from the CFD simulations of the tank by numerically integrating the viscous
and pressure forces on the surfaces of the rake blades and
arms. The computed rake torques are compared to the
experimentally measured values in Fig. 6 as a function of
slurry rheology and rake speed for most of the slurries.
The computed torques are represented as the dashed lines
and are predicted to increase very slightly with rotation
rate for all slurries, in good agreement with the pilot-scale
experiments. Computed torque is consistently approximately 1020% higher than measured torque for the
higher yield stress slurries, slurry #3 to slurry #6. This is
not a large discrepancy and the difference between actual
sediment rheology and the HB estimates could easily be
the source of the difference. The computed torque for the

Fig. 10. Locations at which the solids tracer was added to the slurry
bed.

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M. Rudman et al. / Int. J. Miner. Process. 86 (2008) 114130

Fig. 11. Effect of rake speed on delivery of tracer material to the underflow for the 5-blade rake (290 75 mm blades) and slurry #4 (33 Pa vane yield
stress) from (a) location 1 and (b) location 2.

thinnest slurry (slurry #1) is about 20% lower than the

measured value at a rotation rate of 2 rpm but is only one
third of the measured value at 0.2 rpm, suggesting that

frictional losses in the experiment may be playing a role

here, although this discrepancy is not properly understood. Note that the absolute level of torque is very low in

Fig. 12. Flow visualisation in a model thickener showing the break-up of a single compact dye blob resulting from rake motion. The dye blob was
released below the level of the rake arm at the 6 o'clock position in the image.

M. Rudman et al. / Int. J. Miner. Process. 86 (2008) 114130

125

Fig. 13. Tracer sequence illustrating movement of slurry for the 5-blade rake (290 75 mm blades) operating at 1 rpm. Experimental measurements
(plus offset) top, and CFD simulation results bottom. Results are normalised by respective peak values of RTD for location 1.

the case of slurry #1, being significantly less than the

scatter in the results for the higher viscosity slurries, and
small errors in the rheology parameter fitting could also be
the source of the discrepancy.
Overall, the results seen in Fig. 6 suggest that the CFD
model provides quite good torque estimates, and that the
CFD approach may be extended to predicting torque on
full-scale raking mechanisms with some confidence. One
of the difficulties in practice is that the rheology of bed
material is rarely well characterised, but as seen in Fig. 6 it
is a key factor in determining torque. However, this
situation is not necessarily as bad as it might seem because
the rake could potentially be used as a rheometer to infer
average rheology information, in particular yield stress, of
the sediment bed under different process conditions.
Determining a relationship such as that seen in Fig. 7 could
be undertaken to a reasonable approximation using CFD.
5. Sediment residence time results
Torque predictions are a crude means of validating the
rake CFD model, and in the absence of transport patterns
or velocity measurements (both of which are difficult to
obtain in opaque fine particle slurries), a suitable
validation can be performed by a comparison of calculated
and measured residence time distributions (RTDs) for
tracer released at different locations in the pilot thickener.
For RTD measurements, slurry #4 (33 Pa) was used and
the dyed tracer was made with a sub-sample of this
material as described in Section 2.4. Four separate
experiments were run with tracer addition at the different
locations as shown in Fig. 10. Locations 1 and 2 were a
distance approximately 90 mm above the floor of the tank
and were inside the volume of material swept directly by
the rake. Locations 3 and 4 were approximately 225 mm
above the edge of the floor cone and outside the swept

volume. The radial positions of locations 1 and 4 were 1/

3R and of locations 2 and 3 were 2/3R. Once the solids
tracer had been added at a specified location in the
sediment bed, underflow pumping and rake rotation were
started simultaneously and data measurement using the
reflectance spectrometer was commenced, with measurements made every 2 s.
5.1. Effect of rake speed on solids residence time
Fig. 11a, b shows the appearance of tracer pulses
released at locations 1 and 2 respectively for three
different rake speeds with the 5-blade rake (recall the
underflow rate is 3 m3 h 1). As the rake speed is increased
the dyed material released in the raked zone appears
sooner in the underflow, indicating that the rakes are
moving the material more rapidly at higher speeds as
expected. The tracer released at location 1 appears in a
single pulse for the three rake speeds indicating that it has
either remained as a coherent entity, or the part that did not
remain coherent has not appeared at the underflow or has
Table 2
Comparison between measured and predicted mean residence times (in
seconds) for material released at different locations and different
raking geometries
Location Location Location Location
1
2
3
4
Standard
5-blade
(1 rpm)
Tall
5-blade
(0.67 rpm)
Paddle
blade
(1 rpm)

Measurement 80
CFD
62

180
205

N/D
652

1850
1506

Measurement 180
CFD
76

230
218

600
626

1650
1319

Measurement N/D
CFD
86

N/D
1341

N/D
1119

N/D
371

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M. Rudman et al. / Int. J. Miner. Process. 86 (2008) 114130

Fig. 14. Tracer sequence for the 5-blade rake (290 112 mm blades) rotating at 0.67 rpm. Response (+1.5) from experiment (top) and from simulation
(bottom). Responses normalised by the magnitude of the respective peak values for location 1.

been diluted below the level at which detection is

possible. The peak residence time for 1 rpm is not twice
that of 2 rpm (and the 0.2 rpm peak is not 5 times that of
1 rpm) because underflow pumping also affects residence
time. Thus the rake is not the only factor that determines
transport and residence time, and the basic flow in the tank
interacts with the flow induced by the rake to produce the
tracer RTDs. There is a distinctly different feature in the
tracer curves for the dye released at location 2, where the
tracer appears in the underflow as multiple peaks. This can
be explained by results shown in utalo et al. (2003) in
which a single dye blob at the periphery of the tank in a
model thickener is stretched and divided by the rake
action (see Fig. 12 for an example).
5.2. Effect of tracer release location
Residence time distributions for dye released at
locations 1, 2 and 4 for the 5-blade rake with 75 mm
high blades operating at 1 rpm are shown in Fig. 13 (top is
experimental measurement, bottom is CFD prediction).
Unfortunately, problems with data corruption meant that
the RTD measurement for location 3 were lost for this set
of experiments. Also note that only 20% of the computed
streamlines reached the exit in the CFD simulations for
location 4, further limiting the comparison. The CFD
simulation results for RTDs are in good agreement for
tracer released at locations 1 and 2, and in reasonable
agreement for location 4 (Average residence times for the
4 release positions from experiment and CFD are listed in
Table 2.). Fig. 13 shows that tracer released at location 1
exits before that released at location 2, and tracer from
location 4 takes a very much longer time to reach the
underflow than tracer released in the raking zone. Once
material is in the raking zone under these operating
conditions it usually moves fairly rapidly to the underflow. When it does reach the underflow, if it has travelled

more than a small distance, it appears as multiple peaks

with a frequency approximately equal to the rake rotation
frequency, indicating the importance of rake passage on
transport. The residence time distribution is very broad
indicating that there has been a significant degree of
stretching and possibly break-up of the original tracer
volume (as seen in Fig. 12).
To more clearly show the complexity in the interaction
between raking and underflow, results from a 5-blade rake
with taller blades (290 112 mm) are next considered.
The rake speed in this case was 0.67 rpm which gave an
identical swept volume to the previous case and hence the
flow patterns might be expected to be very similar. The
residence time traces are shown in Fig. 14 (top). Tracer
from locations 1 and 2 is predicted to appear later for the
tall blades than for the shorter blades and tracer from
locations 3 and 4 it is predicted to appear sooner. These
differences in timing in the CFD analyses are small and no
doubt depend on details of the rake geometry. The
differences in the measured durations probably depend on
the exact azimuthal and vertical location at which the
tracer was released.
The experimental results for locations 3 and 4 for this
case are known to be reliable because replicate runs
produced almost identical tracer responses. Most
interesting in Fig. 14 is that the sequence of tracer
detection (from first to last appearance) is locations 1, 2,
3 and finally 4. Location 4 is much closer to the outlet
than locations 2 and 3 but material released there exits
last. A discussion of the reasons for this is given in
Section 5.3. The CFD RTD predictions for this case are
shown in Fig. 14 (bottom), where there is extremely
good agreement for RTDs for locations 2 and 3, and
reasonable agreement for location 4. CFD predictions
for location 1 are significantly less than the measured
value and are closer to the standard blade result [see
Table 2 and Fig. 13 (top)]. In the absence of replicate

M. Rudman et al. / Int. J. Miner. Process. 86 (2008) 114130

127

Fig. 16. Streamlines for material released at locations 14 for standard

5-blade rake at 1 rpm (a, b) and tall blade rake at 0.67 rpm (c, d). Plan
view is shown in the left column (a, c) and side view in the right
column (b,d). The arrow shows the direction of rake motion and the
numbers indicate the start positions of the streamlines.

rake arm in the outer part of the tank transports tracer

from locations 3 and 4 outwards a significant part of the
distance to the periphery of the tank before moving it
downwards into the raked region and eventually to the
underflow, thus explaining the long residence time.

Fig. 15. (a) Velocity vectors and contours of radial velocity on a plane
through the centre of the rake arm. Red represents outward velocity
and blue inward velocity. (b) Velocity vectors and contours of
azimuthal velocity on the same plane. Red represents flow in the
opposite direction to the rake and blue in the same direction as the rake.
This data is plotted in the stationary coordinate frame.

results for location 1, it is believed that the experimental

results are in error in this case.
5.3. Explanation for RTD behaviour
The reasons for the sequence of tracer exit behaviour
can be explained by considering the velocity field obtained from a CFD simulation of the pilot-scale experiment (for tall blade rake, 0.67 rpm, slurry #4), as
shown in Fig. 15a. The red contours represent flow that is
moving radially outwards and blue contours flow that is
moving radially inwards. The generally inward flow of
material at the level of the rake blades transports much of
the tracer placed at locations 1 and 2 to the underflow
fairly rapidly. The outward flow of material above the

Fig. 17. Streamlines for material released at locations 14 for tall 5blade rake at 0.2 rpm (a, b) and 2 rpm (c, d). Compare to results for
0.67 rpm in Fig. 16c, d. Top view is shown in the left column (a, c) and
side view in the right column (b, d). The arrow shows the direction of
rake motion.

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M. Rudman et al. / Int. J. Miner. Process. 86 (2008) 114130

Table 3
Computed mean residence times in seconds for material released at
different locations in the tall blade rake at different rake speeds

0.2 rpm
0.67 rpm
2 rpm

Location 1

Location 2

Location 3

Location 4

55
76
31

419
218
141

901
626
219

145
1319
449

Fig. 15b shows contours of swirl velocity, with blue

contours representing flow that is moving with the rake
(out of the page) and red contours representing flow that is
in the opposite direction to rake motion (into the page).
The rake blades push material in front of them (and suck
material behind them), but the induced flow above the
rake arm has a net motion in the opposite direction to the
rake. This general behaviour is even more noticeable with
the paddle blade and a discussion is left to Section 5.4.
Streamlines for material released at the 4 different
locations are shown in Fig. 16 for the standard 5-blade

rake (Fig. 16a, b) and the tall 5-blade rake (Fig. 16c, d).
The effect of the reverse motion is seen for both geometries in the right-hand images (b, d). For both 5-blade
geometries, material released at locations 3 and 4 swirls
backwards as it moves outwards above the rake arm
toward the periphery of the tank before being moved
downwards into the raked zone. (Note that in the case of
the taller blades, the dye released at location 4 makes this
inward and outward traverse twice because excessive
raking ejects it the first time from the raked zone). Once
the streamlines originating at locations 3 and 4 reach a
level below the rake arm, they travel to the underflow in a
spiral pattern with the same sense as the rake rotation (and
similar to that seen in Fig. 12).
The volume swept by the inner two rake blades is
approximately 2/3 of the total underflow in both 5-blade
cases shown in Fig. 16. Even if these blades moved 100%
of the swept volume inwards (which unreported work
suggests they do not), any tracer released much closer to

Fig. 18. Predicted residence time distributions for the paddle blade rake at 1 rpm.

Fig. 19. Streamlines for material released at locations 14 for the paddle rake at 1 rpm. (a) Top view and (b) side view (right). The arrow shows the
direction of paddle motion.

M. Rudman et al. / Int. J. Miner. Process. 86 (2008) 114130

the rake shaft than location 4 would probably have moved

more directly to the underflow, although neither this
experiment or simulation was performed for this case.
The outward motion seen in Fig. 15 is the result of
excessive raking in the outer parts of the tank resulting
from uniform rake blade size (common to conventional
thickeners) as discussed by Warden (1981). This overraked material cannot flow inwards because the next inner
blade is moving still less material, hence the only place for
this material to go is upwards and back outwards. This
mechanism also contributes to segmentation of the dye
streak seen in Fig. 12.
These results raise some interesting points. They
clearly show that the flow in a thickener bed when raked
with uniform blades is very far from plug flow, and that
significant parts of the outer region of the bed is moved
away from the underflow and also mixed as a
consequence of the over-raking. Because the blades
there in most cases will contribute significantly to the
rake torque, the presence of over-raking suggests that a
reduction in blade size may reduce total rake torque
(which depends on total projected rake area) but will
have no adverse effect on solids transport. The
complexity of the flow patterns and interaction between
rake speed, delivery and underflow rate is highlighted in
Fig. 17 that shows tracer lines for the tall blade rake at
0.2 and 2 rpm respectively. Mean residence times for the
three different rake speeds in this case are presented in
Table 3, where the exit sequence for 0.2 rpm is locations
1, 4, 2 and 3 and for 2 rpm is locations 1, 2, 3 and 4 (the
same sequence as 0.67 rpm).
The pilot-scale experiment at 0.67 rpm potentially
delivered too much material to the underflow (this is the
reason that none of the tracer from location 4 appeared at
the underflow before location 3). When applied to a fullscale thickener, the outermost blades can be radially
transporting 2050 times as much bed material as the
innermost blades and the excess bed material will be
convected up and transported back out many times
before reaching the underflow. The issue of what
constitutes appropriate rake delivery at the underflow
is one that needs further investigation.
5.4. Paddle blade rake
The predicted RTDs for the paddle blade are shown in
Fig. 18, where a very different order of exit is found.
Again, dye released at location 1 is the first to exit, but the
order thereafter is locations 4, 3 and finally 2. Because the
paddle blade does not push material toward the underflow,
dye at location 4 is sucked into the underflow with little
influence from the paddle blade at all. Dye at location 2

129

slowly moves inwards due to underflow suction while

being pushed in front of the paddle. As in the case of the 5blade rake, flow above the rake arm (location 3) moves
counter to the rake direction although it also moves slowly
inwards (see streamlines in Fig. 19).
This reverse flow is counter-intuitive, and deserves a
brief discussion. Because the material in the bed has a
yield stress in these simulations, it will not slip at the
tank walls or cone unless the total stress on the rakes is
greater than the total stress on walls and cone. As the
rake moves forward, bed material is moved in front of it,
but because there must be conservation of mass (and
because the entire bed is constrained to be stationary
away from the rake), there must be reverse flow. The
situation is similar to that of a particle falling in a
container of fluid there must be a net upward fluid
flow to balance the net downward flow of solids. The
presence of reverse flow was also noticed on the surface
of the pilot-scale tank during raking experiments.
In the case of the paddle blade, the flow patterns seen
in Fig. 19 show that the rake does not enhance transport
to the underflow and the torque results shown in Fig. 9
show that rake torque is higher than for a conventional
rake. Hence, operation of such a system (or continuing
to use a rake that has been scaled-up by solids) is likely
to be ineffective as well as requiring more power than a
clean system.
6. Discussion and conclusion
The difficulty in conducting pilot-scale experiments
on an operating site (and the large volumes of materials
needed to conduct them off site) limited the experimental
data that could be obtained in this study to that presented
above. Although the data is not comprehensive, when
considered in conjunction with CFD simulation results, a
number of features of rake operation and sediment
transport in thickener beds have been elucidated.
It is perhaps unsurprising that the two main factors that
determine rake torque are the projected area of the rake in
the direction of travel and the yield stress of the material
through which it is moving. The pilot-scale results show
that for a given rake geometry, the rake torque follows an
almost linear trend with bed yield stress and is a weak
function of rake speed. This dependence suggests that
yield stress measurements of thickener bed material may
be used to obtain a reasonable prediction of the likely
torque provided a suitable relationship can be determined
for a given rake configuration. Alternatively, if the yield
stress measurement cannot be reliably undertaken, an
estimate of yield stress can be obtained from the measured
rake torque provided the linear relationship is known. The

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M. Rudman et al. / Int. J. Miner. Process. 86 (2008) 114130

CFD model was seen to give good torque estimates, and

CFD modelling of the rake moving through different yield
stress materials should provide sufficiently reliable
information to determine the relationship between torque
and yield stress for any given rake geometry.
The key result from the residence time measurements
and predictions is that flow in a thickener bed when raked
by a rake with uniform blades is very far from plug flow.
The outer part of the tank is significantly over-raked in
most cases and material here is needlessly recycled as a
consequence of this. Because the outer rake blades in most
cases will contribute significantly to rake torque, a reduction in blade size (or even removal of some blades)
should have no adverse affect on sediment transport and
should provide an opportunity to reduce overall rake
torque. The results also show the importance of attaining
some balance between rake delivery and underflow
withdrawal. Too much rake delivery will result in needless
recirculation and anecdotal evidence suggests that insufficient raking will increase the likelihood of rat-holing.
Exactly where this balance lies cannot be determined from
the results here and requires further study.
Acknowledgments
A significant part of this work was conducted as part of
the AMIRA P266D Improving Thickener Technology

project. The authors wish to thank the following

companies for their support: Albian Sands Energy,
Alcoa World Alumina, Anglo Gold, Anglo Platinum,
BHP Billiton, Cable Sands, Ciba Specialty Chemicals,
Cytec Australia Holdings, De Beers Consolidated Mines,
EIMCO Process Equipment, GL&V/Dorr Oliver, Glencore AG, Iluka Resources, Kumba Resources, Metso
Minerals, Mt Isa Mines, Nabalco, ONDEO Nalco,
Pasminco, Pechiney Aluminium, Queensland Alumina,
Queensland Nickel, Rio Tinto, Tiwest, True North
Energy, WMC Resources, Worsley Alumina.
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