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By Spooner H. W

The paper describes the search for mineral deposits in an area of 4,500 sq. miles of south-west Tasmania. The area is one of difficult access and the problem of speedy movement and maintenance of field parties was solved by the use of helicopters. The programme has followed a systematic pattern of the aerial photography of the exploration area with the preparation of photQmosaics and topographical base sheets from these mosaics. Geological maps were initially prepared by photogeological interpretation and making use where possible of pre-existing information. The maps produced were later checked by ground traverses. Geophysical maps were obtained by the use of airborne magnetic, electromagnetic and radiometric methods. Geophysical and geological anomalies were checked on the ground by a campaign using ground geophysical equipment in the former case and geological and geochemical work in both instances. Audio Frequency Magnetic and Induced Polarization techniques were used in an area which was covered by several hundred feet of Tertiary sediments.The campaign has reached the stage of the drilling of specific targets.INTRODUCTIONThis paper describes the activities of Lyell-E.Z. Explorations (L.E.E.), an organization which was formed in 1956 by the Mt. Lyell Mining and Railway Co. Ltd. and the Electrolytic Zinc Co. of Australasia Ltd. to explore for mineral deposits in an area of approximately 4,500 sq. miles in southwest and southern Tasmania. To provide the necessary personnel and equipment for this project the exploration resources of both Companies were pooled and augmented and a headquarters was established in Queenstown. The work was directed by a Committee of four made up of officials from both Companies; a review of this structure has recently been presented by Hall (1959).

Jan 1, 1960

By Carol J. Odell

As a mining social practitioner, social indicators are within the purview of required competencies. A situation, where the ER manager requested assistance in quickly deriving a few social indicators for the strategic plan motivates this paper: despite ample technical knowledge about indicators, a clear understanding of stakeholder aspirations and concerns, as well as familiarity with management priorities such a request required reflection to produce a satisfactory approach, which combined pragmatism with enough academic rigour to provide reliable measures, while being justifiable to management who are unfamiliar with many of the pertinent debates. Importance: Social indicators enable the identification of more and less effective mine-community engagement strategies as well as providing primary data to better understand how the mine-community social system responds to different interventions, thus guiding future engagement plans. In addition social indicators: ? Assist communication about social strategies with Engineering and Operations management, using a quantitative language that is familiar to them. ? Provides concrete data to engage stakeholders to discuss progress and challenges arising, to move discussions towards technically robust strategies and away from politically interested proposals. ? Finally, social measurement is required more and more in due diligence, covenants and ongoing monitoring in Independent Engineering assessments of projects for financing. This paper begins by considering some technical considerations that are useful to guide indicator development. It then introduces the field research informing this paper and discusses some useful results in the light of further applicable concepts from the literature. The paper ends by considering corporate aims in applying corporate social responsibility (CSR) programs and discusses the application of the research for practitioners at mining operations, in the light of these aims.

May 1, 2010

By N. R. Morrow, C. C. Harris

The experimental points which describe capillary pressure curves are determined at apparent equilibria which are observed after bydrodynamic flow has ceased. For most systems, the time required to obtain equalization of pressure throughout the discontinuous part of a phase is prohibitive. To permit experimental points to be described as equilibria, a model of capillary behavior is proposed where mass transfer is restricted to bulk fluid flow. Model capillary pressure curves follow if the path described by such points is independent of the rate at which the saturation was changed to attain a capillary pressure point. Aemodified suction potential technique is used to study cyclic relationships between capillary pressure and moisture content for a porous mass. The time taken to complete an experiment was greatly reduced by using small samples. INTRODUCTION Capillary retention of liquid by porous materials has been investigated in the fields of hydrology,l soil science,2 oil reservoir engineering,3 chemical engineering," soil mechanics,5 textiles: paper making: and building materials In studies of the immiscible displacement of one fluid by another within a porous bed, drainage columnsl and suction potential techniques2 have been used to obtain relationships between pressure deficiency and saturation (Fig. 1). Except where there is no hysteresis of contact angle and the solid is of simple geometry, such as a tube of uniform cross section, there is hysteresis in the relationship between capillary pressure and saturation.2 The relationship which has received most attention is displacement of fluid from an initially saturated bed (Fig. 1, Curve R2), the final condition being an irreducible minimum fluid saturation Swr. Imbibition (Fig. 1, Curve A), further desaturation (Fig. 1, Curve R), and intermediate scanning curves have been studied to a lesser but increasing extent.2 ,3,9-12 This paper first considers the nature of the experimental points tracing the capillary pressure curves with respect to the modes and rates of mass transfer which are operative during the course of measurement. There are clear indications that the experimental points which describe these curves are obtained at apparent equilibria which are observed when viscous fluid flow has ceased; and any further changes in the fluid distribution are the result of much slower mass transfer processes, such as diffusion. Unless stated otherwise, this discussion applies to a stable packing of equal, smooth, hydrophilic spheres supported by a suction plate5 with water as the wetting phase and air as the nonwetting phase. The discussion can also be applied, in many

Jan 1, 1966

By B. Asbury, M. Cigla, C. Balci

The Western Mining Resource Center (WMRC) at the Colorado School of Mines (CSM) received a grant from the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) to perform a study that will help reduce the amount of respirable dust generated from the cutting of coal. The study is based upon laboratory testing and field experience. This information is being used to develop a new cutterhead design in conjunction with Joy Mining Machinery. The new cutterhead design is being evaluated with existing computer models developed at CSM. The new continuous miner cutterhead will be tested at the Twenty Mile Coal Company’s Foidal Creek Mine. Baseline testing with the current cutterhead will also be performed. This paper presents laboratory test results, design methodology, and test results performed to date.

Jan 1, 2002

By Edward A. Barrett, Kathleen M. Kowalski-Trakofler

This paper discusses the application of a training intervention that uses degraded images for improving the hazard recognition skills of miners. Method: NIOSH researchers, in an extensive literature review, identified fundamental psychological principles on perception that may be employed to enhance the ability of miners to recognize and respond to hazards in their dangerous work environment. Three studies were conducted to evaluate the effectiveness of the degraded image training intervention. A model of hazard recognition was developed to guide the study. Results: In the first study, miners from Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Alabama, who were taught with the aid of degraded images, scored significantly better on follow—up hazard recognition performance measures than those trained using traditional instructional methodologies. The second and third studies investigated the effectiveness of the training intervention at two mining companies. Data collected over a3—year period showed that lost—time injuries at mines in Alabama and Illinois declined soon after the training intervention was instituted. Impact on Industry: Further exploration of the hazard recognition model and the development of other interventions based on the model could support the validity of the steps in the hazard recognition model.

By J. B. Clark

In multiphase ternary diffusion studies, plots of the variation bf the composition on the isotherm constitutes one of the most effective methods of presenting experimental results, especially if such plots are made in a manner which relates the composition path on the isotherm with the diffusion layer structure in the couple. Unfortunately, if different conventions for plotting are used serious misinterpretations occur readily, causing apparent disagreement between investigators who actually share the same viewpoint. A common convention for mapping these diffusion paths is needed at this time because with the increasing use of the electron-probe X-ray microanalyzer, a much greater number of ternary diffusion studies can be expected in the near future. In an effort to prevent unnecessary confusion in the future litera- ture, a convention for these plots is proposed, as outlined below. A hypothetical example of the use of these conventions is given in Fig. 1 where the path of composition through the diffusion structure of the 100 pct A/50 pct B, 50 pct C couple is plotted on the appropriate isotherm of the ABC system. The lower case letters relate the region in the diffusion layer structure to the appropriate composition on the ternary isotherm. 1) The diffusion path is plotted on the isothermal section corresponding to the diffusion temperature of the couple. 2) The terminal compositions of the plotted diffusion path are the initial compositions of the couple halves—provided infinite boundary conditions are maintained. If, in either couple half, infinite conditions are not maintained, then the path terminates at the composition of the exterior surface of the couple. If, at this surface, the composition varies with time or if the plotted path is time dependent, then the diffusion time should be noted beside the plotted path. 3) A solid line crossing a single phase field (e.g., line a-b in Fig. 1) denotes an existing layer of that phase in the diffused couple. 4) A dashed line crossing a two-phase field parallel to the tie lines (e.g., line g-h) represents an interface between the two phases with interfacial compositions designated by the ends of the tie-line. The line represents no spatial extent. 5) A solid line crossing a two-phase field so as to cut tie lines (e.g., line b-c or line j-k) represents a locally equilibrated columnar two-phase layer. The solid line should cut those tie lines which correspond to the lateral interfacial equilibria along the columnar

Jan 1, 1963

By Leslie F. Ruppert

The US Geological Survey (USGS) is currently conducting a coal resource assessment of the coalbeds and zones that are projected to provide the bulk of the nation’s resources for the next few decades. The Pittsburgh and Upper Freeport coals are the first two beds in the northern and central Appalachian basin region to undergo fully digital coal assessments. The bed-specific assessments are being carried out in partnership with the state geologic surveys of West Virginia, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Maryland. Comprehensive stratigraphic and geochemical databases have been developed for both of the beds. The extent of the bed with mined areas, structure contour, isopach, and overburden thickness maps for the Pittsburgh coal bed have been released as USGS open-file reports.

Jan 1, 1999

By L. F. Miao

Studies were carried out to investigate the ultimate soil pressure acting on pile(s) undergoing lateral soil movement in soft clay. A special apparatus has been designed to apply a uniform rectangular profile of lateral soil movement on the rigid pile(s) with pinned head and tip conditions to obtain the ultimate soil pressure. The piles were 16 mm (5/8 in) in diameter. For the pile group tests, the behavior of different number of piles (2, 3, 4, 6 and 9), pile arrangements and center-to-center spacings (3 and 6 diameters) were investigated. In this paper, the group factors of 11 combinations of number of piles, pile arrangements and pile spacings are presented. The group factors are given for individual piles in a pile group as well as for the entire group. Generally, the group factors of individual piles in a group varied significantly according to pile spacing in both directions, and pile arrangement; the group factor of the whole group reduced with an increasing number of piles, and increased with increasing pile spacing. For a pile group with the same number of piles but different pile arrangement, no significant difference was found in the group factors for the entire group.

Jan 1, 2008

By Brett Zernich, Michael Krulc, Brett Robinson

This paper provides an account of the efforts undertaken to construct the Northeast Interceptor Sewer (NEIS) project, which is a portion of a much larger program in Los Angeles, California to upgrade the city’s wastewater facilities. The project consisted of a number of elements, including both soft ground and rock slurry wall shafts, drilled shafts, soft ground EPBM mining, rock TBM mining, large diameter pipe placement, and underground structure construction. The need to complete the project under strict schedule constraints, in addition to the challenges of underground construction in congested urban areas, necessitated the work be undertaken with the proper balance of state of the art equipment, and thoughtful planning. The paper will detail the means, methods, and equipment used on the project, as well as discuss several of the unforeseen conditions encountered during construction.

Jan 1, 2005

Detachment of Particles from Bubbles in a Stirred Cell

Sep 13, 2010

Resolution Copper Mine is planned to be a 2000 m deep panel cave mine with virgin rock temperatures above 80°C in rock with a high crystalline silica content. The planned run-of-mine production rate is 120 kt/day. The project is in prefeasibility evaluation. This paper discusses features of the ventilation system design, which include multiple ventilation shafts with total flow of about 3000 m³/s and both surface and underground refrigeration systems with more than 140 MW total capacity. This will be a very challenging mine to ventilate, but this work has demonstrated that it will be technically achievable with the application of existing technology.

Jan 1, 2014

By R. D. Leitch

"INTRODUCTION The character of mine drainage from areas of low pyritic coal3 and from average pyritic coal4 has been investigated, and to complete the study it seemed desirable to select a number of mines situated in high pyritic are as to determine whether or not this variation determines the relative acidity of drainage from mines operating in these characteristic coal fields. Advantage has been taken of some worked on in 1918 by Henry Leighton 5, then Professor of Economic Geology, University of Pittsburgh. He visited and has reported certain areas of high pyritic coal which we also visited during this study. Many of the mines were found to be idle in 1930 and a few were caved shut, apparently for several years. However, samples of the outflow from all mines visited were collected if possible and analyzed, and some general information was gathered for each mine. The map (fig. 1) shows the location of these areas as given by Leighton.ACKNOWLEDGMENTSThe information and assistance obtained from officials and others at the mines visited during this study are gratefully acknowledged, as well as the original suggestion from Dr. Glenn V. Brown of the State Sanitary Water Board who called attention to the desirability of such a study.Thanks are also especially due the coal laboratory of the United States Bureau of Mines, under the direction of H. M. Cooper, for the analyses and determination of sulphur forms in the large number of solid samples necessary to the work reported,This study has been carried on under the direction of R. R. Sayers, chief, health and safety branch, and W. P. Yant, supervising engineer, Pittsburgh Experiment Station, of the U. S. Bureau of Mines."

Jan 1, 1932

By P González, E Córdova, E Faundez

An integrated mine system must be capable of displaying and reporting valuable information that can be used to easily understand, manage and take action on the key parameters being reported.One of the key aspects of integration is the standardisation of the mine information up to a level capable of adapting the main characteristics of past projects at the mine and enforcing the same or higher standards for newer projects being developed.At the El Teniente mine, photogrammetry is used to map the advance of horizontal developments, and the constructed 3D representation of each face is then used by the geologists to obtain structural information about the areas being photographed.The mine realised that valuable mining information could also be extracted from the photogrammetry being applied, with three possible areas of development envisioned.The first area was creating a link between the developments being planned on a yearly and monthly basis and matching them with plan sections of the 3D developments of the system to account for any deviations.The second area was to use vertical sections of the 3D developments to estimate the overbreak of the excavations in different areas of the mine.The third area was the provision of a more detailed analysis of the sections so that they could provide information on the thickness of the shotcrete being applied.This paper presents the different alternatives being used and examines how the project is currently being developed and managed at the mine. It also looks at the challenges associated with implementing the reporting platform and the results being obtained.CITATION:Córdova, E, Benado, D, González, P and Faundez, E, 2016. Mine planning information from photogrammetry sources at the El Teniente Mine, in Proceedings Seventh International Conference and Exhibition on Mass Mining (MassMin 2016), pp 653–658 (The Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy: Melbourne).

May 9, 2016

By C. Schuffeneger

"The design of SAG milling circuits for mining projects requires the incorporation of the energy consumption considerations and the evaluation between different flexibility-adding options to absorb the time-dependent variation in the ore lithology. In order to expand the focus of the engineering design, a higher level of deepness and quality in the baseline information must be achieved to elucidate all of the constraints on throughput, energy consumption and product quality generating a design optimization consistent with an integrated vision of the process. This paper presents a review of a collection of typical examples of the copper and gold mining project in the Chilean Andes, in which both process and energy efficiency criteria are considered when the focus is to deliver an integral solution that incorporate those areas in the design. The intensive use of energy in the SAG milling, the process continuity and the quality of the product are a function of the proper design and selection of grinding equipment and plant layout, aligned with the mining plan and associated with projected future expansions and production increases.INTRODUCTION Autogenous and Semiautogenous grinding technology, large diameter and short length mills, begins with the Handsel design. During the decade of 1930’s, Handsel-Hardinge studies led to cascade mill development. Nowadays, 80 years later, continuous improvements in design and technology have been conducted to a completely new generation of gearless SAG mills that have led to an increasing capacity at the concentrator plants. Considering the existing alternatives, SAG mills are the most implemented option for the grinding circuit today. This work presents a review of the SAG mill implementation parameters and circuit considerations and its correlations in the most recent projects in Chile with an ore treatment capacity above 50 ktpd since the decade of the 90’s up to now. From this period, the tendencies will be analyzed using project design data. Based on process design information, the recent SAG mill history in relevant projects related to the new generation of commercial SAG mills, technical associated considerations and performance will be discussed. Circuit selection based on energy utilization will be revised to bring up a more holistic perspective on the SAG mill circuit design concepts. As is now well known, the heart of every concentrator plant are the grinding mills. Higher demands on throughput, availability and power consumption optimizations require not only high performance electrical equipment but also a well selected grinding circuit. The energy efficiency issues associated to the circuits design will be reviewed."

Jan 1, 2012

By M. Rufli

Until not so long ago most ring geared mills were operated with fix speed motors only. By using the latest generation of medium voltage frequency converters, new possibilities have arisen to improve the grinding process. Beside all the direct and indirect advantages, several dedicated functions have now been implemented for ring geared grinding mills in the minerals industry. The sophisticated operational functions ensure a smooth, safe and reliable operation with minimum stress for the mechanical equipment and therefore utmost availability of the mill. Several papers have already been presented concerning the benefits of using this state of the art technology for mill drives. Now this paper is focusing on the experiences gained with this kind of sophisticated ring geared mill drive system rather than only show and explains the operational benefit of the different functions. Several measurements of different operating conditions, starting, frozen charge remover, controlled roll back, backlash, etc., made on an installed and commissioned 2 x 5 MW dual pinion ring geared mill drive system will be shown and discussed. The accuracy of the load sharing between the two 5 MW motors during starting, normal operation and stopping will be demonstrated using real measurements from an operating system. Finally the inherent features of these drive systems are briefly discussed.

Jan 1, 2011

By AIME AIME

WILBER JUDSON is one of that fairly large group of mining engineers that graduated at an Eastern college, worked his way up in various jobs in the West and in the Latin-American countries, and finally came to New York as an administrative officer of a large mining company. Since coming to New York he has been a loyal friend and counselor of the A.I.M.E., and is now serving a second term as one of its Directors, his first term covering the period 1935-1938. Mr. Judson was born in the capital city of Michigan on July 26, 1880. Probably it was his roving spirit rather than professorial urging that was responsible for the fact that four colleges were responsible for his education: Northwestern, University of Michigan, Harvard (S.B., 1901), and the Michigan College of Mines (graduate study). In his first ten years of professional work he might have been found serving as mine foreman at Catamarca in the Argentine, as superintendent of the Inter Ocean mine at Sunshine, Colo.. as foreman for the Cerro Prieto, Magdalena, Sonora, as superintendent of the Hudson Iron Co. in New York, or as manager of the Dolores mine in Chihuahua for the Mines Co. of America, or in Spain, or in Panama.

Jan 1, 1942

By J. P. F. Charpin

The transport of large boulders in a furrow from a mining area to a nearby pond was considered. The furrow is filled with a mixture of water and soil particles flowing down to the pond at high velocity. Due to operating constraints, the slope of the furrow is reduced progressively. A relationship is derived, relating the slope of the furrow and the composition of the fluid to the maximum size and shape of the transported boulders. The characteristics of the boulders carried all the way down to the pond may then be determined.

Jan 1, 2007

By M Wortley, R Morrison, T Rivett

The tracking of ore through process hold-ups such as stockpiles has been traditionally been difficult to achieve. The inability to pinpoint the exact source in the mine of material that is feeding a processing plant has led to inefficient mine-mill reconciliation processes. In addition, a lack of understanding of the behaviour of ore in process hold-ups such as bins and stockpiles often leads to poor predictions of plant performance and to poor reconciliation of this to the orebody.This paper reports on two short case studies. One case study addresses tracking ore from various parts of two mines to the concentrator. The other follows synthetic particles through the coarse ore stockpile. Both studies use radio-frequency identification (RFID) tracer technology. The paper concludes by discussing general strategies for implementation of such concepts into mine-mill metal accounting and reconciliation systems. As shown in this paper, reliable ore tracking systems will allow much more effective mine-mill reconciliations as well as the ability to model process hold-ups with regard to size by residence time distributions. This should, in turn, allow metallurgists to have a better understanding of the size and grade of material that will report to the plant at different process hold-up (eg stockpile) conditions.

Jan 1, 2009

By P Hunger, H Günter, F Heinicke

High pressure grinding rolls (HPGR) have been used for more than 20 years to grind iron ore pellet feed. Besides coarse comminution (crushing), where HPGR are installed upstream of the ball mill, there are numerous flow sheets where HPGR are used after ball milling and dewatering for re- or finish grinding.There is a clear growing interest in grinding of pellet feed with HPGR during the last few years. In addition to their known advantages of low specific energy consumption, high availability, low steel consumption and improved pelletising processes the lower environmental load (reduced or no water consumption) became a strong driving factor for the application of HPGR in pellet feed grinding.This growing demand increases the interest in better understanding of the HPGR grinding process with fine iron ore concentrates. One of the most important process parameters is the moisture content of the feed material which influences the performance of the HPGR enormously. The HPGR can react to fluctuations of the fresh feed properties to a certain degree by adjusting grinding force and roller speed. Nevertheless, there are limitations by the physics of the compression process and the capability of water absorption by the concentrate. The capability varies for different concentrates and different specific surface areas. This fact has to be considered during engineering of the beneficiation plant.The paper focuses on the influence of feed moisture content on the HPGR performance in view of throughput, increase of Blaine number and process stability on the basis of numerous pilot plant tests, modelling results and industrial experiences.CITATION:Heinicke, F, Günter, H and Hunger, P, 2017. Influence of feed moisture on high pressure grinding roll pellet feed grinding, in Proceedings Iron Ore 2017, pp 187–194 (The Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy: Melbourne).

Jul 24, 2017

By C. Musingwini

An often overlooked factor in the analysis of mine layouts and schedules is technical operating flexibility (or tactical flexibility), mainly due to its nebulous nature. By glossing over technical operating flexibility the resultant mine layouts and schedules maybe suboptimal. The need to incorporate technical operating flexibility into the analysis and comparison of mine layouts and schedules is increasing in importance. The nature of technical operating flexibility is illustrated, previous work on valuing of operating flexibility reviewed, and a proposal made on how technical operating flexibility can be quantified for tabular reef mines by using a platinum reef deposit as a case study. Once technical operating flexibility has been quantified it becomes possible to explore its incorporation into the analysis of mine layouts and schedules and subsequent optimization processes. This paper is a revised version of a paper presented in the Proceedings of the Second International Platinum Conference, ?Platinum Surges Ahead? in 2006. The work described in this paper is part of a current PhD study at the University of the Witwatersrand. Keywords: mine plans, layouts, schedules, technical operating flexibility/tactical flexibility, ore availability.

Jan 1, 2007