Rod Mill Product Control and Its Relation to Energy Consumption: A Case Study

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The detailed comments are listed below:

1. The introduction section is very weak. References used are very old (There is no ref. after year 2018). Try adding a few current published works and bridging previously published work with current work. Clearly mention the novelty of the work in the introduction section.
2. Elaborate the mathematical model and the solution scheme. How your mathematical model different from model in 30-31.
3. Line#117:  ASTM standard number should be given along with the Ref.
4. Check the figure captions. Figure 6 has been used two times.
5. It is difficult to read fonts in Fig. 5 and 6. It should be equivalent to running text.
6. In the conclusion section, add key finding of the work in the bullet form.

Author Response

Dear reviewer

Thank you very much for your comments. Please, you can find a document with the responses to your comments.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

The manuscript is good and within the scope of the journal but i have some concerns as follows

1.  There is no quantitative analysis and comparison in the abstract, please include it
2. Some assumptions are stated in various sections. Justifications should be provided on these assumptions. Evaluation on how they will affect the results should be made.
3. The discussion section in the present form is relatively weak and should be strengthened with more details and justifications.
4. Moreover, the manuscript could be substantially improved by relying and citing more on recent literature about contemporary real-life case studies of sustainability techniques.
5. There should be a procedure step or a figure that may explain how the whole research was conducted in the methodology section
6.  

Author Response

Dear reviewer

Thank you very much for your comments. Please, you can find a document with the responses to your observations. 

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

This study is important and straightforward to control the size reduction of the material without increasing the energy consumption in rod milling. The conclusion is based on the laboratory-scale experimental results, though the results are highly dependent on and influenced by the size difference between actual equipment and equivalent ones in the laboratory. Overall, it is based on real problems and the authors try to solve them with well-design experiments. 

Author Response

Dear reviewer

Thank you very much for your comments. 

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 4 Report

The article discusses in detail the examination of the material fragmentation control, taking into account the activities leading to the reduction of energy consumption. It has been shown that by changing the critical speed of the mill or the grinding mill charge, the effect on reducing energy consumption is noticeable. Methods of controlling product particle size are demonstrated by varying the feed rate, lifter, and bar geometry while keeping energy utilization constant. The work has a high academic level. 

Author Response

Dear reviewer

Thank you very much for your comments

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

Accept in present form.

Reviewer 2 Report

The authors have tried their best to address my issue accordingly. But little typos and grammatical error should again check

This manuscript is a resubmission of an earlier submission. The following is a list of the peer review reports and author responses from that submission.

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Please see the attached file.

Comments for author File: Comments.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

The paper investigates optimisation opportunities for operating Rod mills to generate less fines during grinding potash.

The paper covers extensive work conducted by the authors. However, I have reservations about the quality of the work and the scientific approach taken by the authors. The paper, after revision, could be a good technical note. A proper research plan is required to ensure the scientific approach covers all required aspects for a research paper.

Investigating optimisation opportunities for improving energy consumption and fine generation requires a systematic approach that is not followed in this work. The first step is to identify key factors that can be changed, including the design factors, operational factors, and process control. The next step is conducting systematic experimental work through the use of experimental design to identify factors that are significant in affecting energy consumption and fine generation. This work will help to establish relationships which then can feed into the modelling. The modelling at the end can be a pathway to conduct optimisation.

The current approach presented in this paper does not provide the rationale behind the experimental work conducted, the values selected for each factor and also it is missing many factors which play a role in energy consumption and fine generation, such as grinding media size distribution, lifter face angle, etc.

- English and quality of writing

I recommend amending the title of the paper since it is not a true reflection of the paper content and its objective. Besides, it is not structured properly from a grammatical point.

The paper requires a thorough revision to improve the quality of its English language. There are many sentences that are not structured correctly grammatically. Some terms used in the paper are not common and needs to change. For example, the term operative is not a correct term for operating, which is what the authors refer to in some of their sentences.

- Technical comments

The Introduction is not structured properly. The paper objectives need to be clear. The Introduction currently lists a long list of factors hic are affecting the performance of Ball mills and Rod mills, and it is not very clear which factors are relevant for Rod mills. Besides, some of those factors are not investigated in this study. I recommend restructuring the Introduction into three sections and presenting the objectives in a section. Presenting factors affecting energy consumption in another section and factors affecting fine generation in the third section. Under each section, make sure factors that are not relevant to Rod mills are removed. Reference to works on Ball mill needs justification in regard to its relevance to Rod Mills.

Under materials and Method, explaining calculations for Particle Size Distribution (PSD) is not relevant since calculating PSD is a standard method in the minerals industry, and there is no need to explain how to calculate % retained and % passing on each size.

It wasn’t clear from the paper what experimental design was selected to conduct the experimental work? Given the number of factors in this investigation, a proper experimental design and statistical analysis are essential.

The paper presented a mathematical modelling work, but the outcome was validation of the model with experimental data, and its relevance to the optimisation work was not clear.

The discussion is the presentation of the results. It lacks an in-depth analysis of the underlying reasons for the observations, which can guide the optimisation effort and future investigations.

The use of graphs and tables could improve when they are used for presenting the results. Some of the tables, such as the Table presented between Table 5 and Table 6 (This table is missing title), Table 6 and Table 7, are better to be presented as Figures. Some of the figures such as Figure 7 can be organised simpler to make it easier to visualise the results.

Reviewer 3 Report

When opening the manuscript, the unformatted text appears at first glance, as recommended by Energies journal (see Instructions for authors and Word Template). The submitted manuscript should be rejected by the Academic Editor and not admitted to the review stage.

The abstract should be more concise, and I suggest Authors provide the background, target, significance, methodology, main results, and so on, in this abstract.

The introduction section is poorly organized, there are many missing links, and in addition, it is good to express the need for the study with the backlog of literature exists in the framework. There is no background in this introduction stating the urge and novelty of the study in which innovative ideas must be flown through the background along with the useful insights. What is the novelty for this article compared with existing studies?

There is no literature review in this manuscript. I have not anywhere seen any research gap as a sub section, which is very important for proving the novelty of the paper.

 What are differences between your results and previous studies? etc. Conclusion section looks like a summary, there are no in-depth insights on this section.