Characterization of Langkawi black sand for the recovery of titanium had been carried out in this study. In this study, the size distribution of black sand particles was determined by the sieve analysis whereas the specimen of different portion of black sand for each size of particle was identified by X-ray diffraction (XRD). The highest percentage in particle size was illustrated as 75.40% in 75μm. Techniques of X-ray diffraction (XRD) has been used to identify and analyze the ilmenite and rutile phase in the Langkawi black sand.

Processing of Langkawi black sand for the recovery of metals had been carried out in this study. The samples were characterized after sieve analysis. Magnetic separator is used to separate between magnetic and non-magnetic portion of blank sand. XRF and FTIR were used to know the metal content in black sand. Before magnetic separation black sand contain about 43.2 wt% SiO2, Al2O3 with 21.1 wt% and Fe2O3 with 17.2 wt% and 12.0% TiO2.

Valuable minerals are defined as mineral which having good opportunities to economic and consireable important. The most commonly occurring sand mineral deposits are ilmenite, rutile, magnetite, cassiterite, monazite, tourmaline, zircon, kyanite, silimanite, and garnet. In Malaysia, mineral sand deposits is found in Langkawi which known as black sand Langkawi. Langkawi black sand having high amount of valuable minerals that is very crucial in the industrial and construction products. Characterizations of black sand acquire different techniques to concentrate and separate valuable minerals. These techniques utilize different in physical or chemical properties of the valuable and gangue (wastes) minerals. For magnetic is based on natural or induced differences in magnetic susceptibility or conductivity of the minerals.. They are used to distinguish and extract magnetic, slightly magnetic and non-magnetic components present in the heavy fraction (Rutile, Ilmenite, Magnetite, Garnets, Zircon and Monazite). All minerals will have one of three magnetic properties: ferromagnetic, paramagnetic and diamagnetic. Ferromagnetic minerals (i.e. Magnetite and Ilmenite) are magnetic and easily attracted to the poles of magnet. Paramagnetic and diamagnetic minerals in the group magnetic, but if the mixture of paramagnetic and diamagnetic minerals are passed through a magnetic field, the paramagnetic minerals will be pulled into the field and diamagnetic minerals separated from the field. By varying the intensity of the magnetic field, it is also possible to separate different paramagnetic minerals from each other. In this study, techniques used to separate valuable minerals from black sand are magnetic separator.