A method for measuring the mineralogical variation of spoils from British collieries

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Abstract
A semi-quantitative mineralogical analysis of colliery spoil by XRD has been developed and used to compare spoils from eight collieries, in connection with work on the production of synthetic dense aggregates from spoil. Phase analysis of clay, which constitutes over half of all these spoils, is carried out by comparing X-ray peak areas of oriented specimens after heating and treatment with ethylene glycol. Total clay is obtained by difference, after determination of quartz and other minerals by an internal standard technique, allowing calculation of the proportion of each clay mineral. The results are tested against chemical analysis and a semiquantitative X-ray analysis of the chlorite present indicated that it is a highly ferruginous variety. Differences are detected in the mineralogy of all eight spoils but, except for the predominance of kaolinite in the spoils from Scotland, these differences are small.

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