Slurry


A slurry is a mixture of solids denser than water suspended in liquid, usually water. The most common use of slurry is as a means of transporting solids, the liquid being a carrier that is pumped on a device such as a centrifugal pump. The size of solid particles may vary from 1 micron up to hundreds of millimeters.
The particles may settle below a certain transport velocity and the mixture can behave as a Newtonian or non-Newtonian fluid. Depending on the mixture, the slurry may be abrasive and/or corrosive.

Examples

Examples of slurries include:

Determining solids fraction

To determine the percent solids of a slurry from the density of the slurry, solids and liquid
where
In aqueous slurries, as is common in mineral processing, the specific gravity of the species is typically used, and since is taken to be 1, this relation is typically written:
even though specific gravity with units tonnes/m^3 is used instead of the SI density unit, kg/m^3.

Liquid mass from mass fraction of solids

To determine the mass of liquid in a sample given the mass of solids and the mass fraction:
By definition
therefore
and
then
and therefore
where

Volumetric fraction from mass fraction

Equivalently
and in a minerals processing context where the specific gravity of the liquid is taken to be one:
So
and
Then combining with the first equation:
So
Then since
we conclude that
where