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By Paul J. Lauricella

This presentation will summarize the basic safety components of an underground safety program. The program will begin with the first ingredient to a successful safety program, top management support, and continue through emergency services. Particular attention will be devoted to top management support for the safety program.

Jan 1, 1985

By Harry Sutcliffe, George B. Wallace, Madan M. Singh

INTRODUCTION Several recent estimates have predicted that the extent of underground tunneling in the future will far surpass past records. It is also emphasized that the expected increase depends largely on the cost of tunneling and hence every effort should be made to reduce this price. The largest items of expense in some tunneling programs are not related to the technical problems encountered but rather the human factors involved in contracting and executing the project. In order to examine the mutual interactions between the groups involved in tunnel programs, the Engineering Foundation sponsored a conference on "Owner-Engineer-Contractor Relations in Tunneling", July 12-16, 1971 at Deerfield, Massachusetts. The meeting was cosponsored by the Associated General Contractors of America and the Construction Division of the American Society of Civil Engineers. The seminar was attended by representatives of contractors, owners, and engineers who drafted and approved a set of recommendations based on the ideas generated during the discussions. It was also suggested that the resulting document be given as wide publicity as possible amongst the underground construction community. The First Annual Rapid Excavation and Tunneling Conference provides an excellent forum for this presentation.

Jan 1, 1997

By I. E. Lewis, W. R. Hopkins

Flowsheet improvements, such as series/parallel SX plant configurations, discontinuation of plant sumps and improved filter pumping concepts, the use of in-settler baffle systems, and the Krebs and combined mixer-settler designs offer opportunities to reduce SX plant cost. Today's plants employ permanent cathodes and mechanical stripping, and the increased capital cost can be offset by labor savings and higher current densities. The wider use of HDPE and new cell construction materials also reduce capital cost. The "Portelex" type of relocatable design embodies such new, cost-saving measures in a simple basic plant. Organic inventory and losses are reduced by new, fast-settling, hybrid organic reagents with improved kinetics and selectivity.

Jan 1, 1991

By P. K. Sims

Extensive mineralization in the basal part of the Duluth Complex of Middle Proterozoic (Keweenawan) age in northeast Minnesota has been explored during the past 30 years as a potential source of copper and nickel from sulfide-bearing assemblages. Very large resources of low grade and marginal material have been delineated by drilling and by test shafts sunk by at least five private mining companies, but none of the properties has yet been mined. With few exceptions, grade and tonnage figures for specific properties have not been released, but the magnitude of the resources has been estimated by the Minnesota Geological Survey and the Minnesota Dept. of Natural Resources as constituting several billion tons of low grade and marginal copper- and nickel-bearing material - a major combined copper-nickel resource of international importance.

Jan 1, 1991

By Dominic F. Howarth

Cuttability and borability assessment methods in rock and coal are reviewed. TBM, roadheader and coal cutting machine boring rates can be predicted from a knowledge of machine, intact rock property and rock mass parameters. Results that were obtained from a detailed analysis of two TBM borability prediction methods and comparison with data from twenty case histories, show that a simple, low-cost method that uses one machine parameter and one rock parameter compares very favourably with a sophisticated, high-cost method that also includes details of rock mass characteristics (discontinuity, type frequency and orientation).

Jan 1, 1987

By R. V. Ramani, R. Srikanth, R. Zhao

A two-part study was conducted to understand the factors affecting respirable dust generation potential or dustiness of coal seams. In the first part, the data from three prior comprehensive laboratory studies was analyzed to establish quantitative relationships between respirable dust generation potential and coal characteristics. This analysis indicates that respirable dust generation rate is positively correlated with Hardgrove Grindability Index (HGI), fuel ratio (fixed carbodvolatile matter), Vitrinke Reflectance (VR), and Level of Organic Metamorphism (LOM). In the second part, specially-designed single breakage experiments were conducted to determine the primary dust generation potential of 17 coal samples obtained from four continuous miner sections, three longwall sections, and the Penn State Coal Data Bank. The single breakage study indicates that primary dust generation rate is positively correlated with fixed carbon content, fuel ratio (fixed carbon/volatile matter), VR, and LOM. Since VR and LOM are strongly influenced by the process of coalification, differences in respirable dust generation rates in different coal seams may be explained by the thermal metamorphism of sedimentary organic matter during subsurface burial.

Jan 1, 1995

By R. Kramer

The Process Mineralogy review arrived too late to appear in the May issue. The Process Mineralogy Committee scheduled programs with both SME and The Metallurgical Society. At the 1991 SME Annual Meeting in Denver, CO the committee sponsored five sessions containing 31 papers. Four process mineralogy sessions were sponsored at the 1992 annual TMS meeting in San Diego, CA. Process mineralogy is used to understand and evaluate mineral behaviors during mineral beneficiation, phase reactions during metallurgy, recoveries and reactions of precious metals during processing and mineral and phase behaviors with respect to environmental problems. The most recent refinement in mineralogical studies with respect to mineral beneficiation has been the wider use of image analysis and combined materials balancing techniques of image analysis data. Image analyzers that can perform analysis with respect to mineral beneficiation are expensive. They are used only for solving major processing problems. Nevertheless, the methodology of analysis continues to be refined. Much better data are collected, and methods of evaluating the data continue to improve. One interesting development involves modifying the ultrasound unit used in medical studies to perform a three-dimensional analysis of ore particles.

Jan 1, 1992

By Victor F. Hollister

Porphyry-type deposits are characterized by mineralization in, as well as adjacent to, an igneous body, usually a porphyritic stock. One deposit style includes both mineral dissemination and mineralized veinlets, and both porphyry copper and porphyry molybdenum deposits are characterized by dissemination and veinlet control of ore minerals. Those gold deposits that occur in stocks, with gold occur- ring in veinlets and disseminations within the stock, clearly are can- didates for consideration as porphyry gold type. Porphyry copper and porphyry molybdenum deposits are also characterized by potassic, phyllic, argillic, orpropyllitic alteration or some combination of these alteration types. Where two or more alteration zones are present, these are arranged in a sequential outcrop pattern. Gold occurring in dissemination and in veinlets in as well as adjacent to stocks, and which also occur in typical pervasive porphyry alteration suits, constitute a clearly defined class of deposit that fits the definition of a porphyry gold type. Porphyry copper deposits may carry appreciable gold. Porphyry copper-gold deposits are known from all porphyry copper provinces. This chapter is intended to cover porphyry gold occurrences that may have little or no copper or molybdenum as economic concentrations.

Jan 1, 1991

By J. D. Pfarr

The Homestake Mine, located in Lead, SD, has been in business for 113 years. Until 10 years ago, conventional mining methods were used to extract ore. Due to complexities in the ore bodies and increasing costs, new technology was introduced to the mine. An integral part of this technology was mechanized cut-and-fill mining. This mining method currently produces about 50% of the annual production and has proven to he safe and economical. As a result, the Homestake Mine remains competitive in today's market.

Jan 1, 1992

By Luis Tavares Ribeiro

Dynamic programming is based on the-, application of a simple property formulated by Bellman in his principle of optimality (Bellman, 1957): "An optimal policy has the property that whatever the initial state and initial decision are, the-remaining decisions must constitute an optimal policy with regard to the state resulting from the first decision". The method is charaterised by: (Dowd, 1979) a) A function defining the total value at each decision time of the system. b) The set of permissible decisions. c) The present state of the system. d) The number of steps remaining before the procedure is terminated.

Jan 1, 1982

By J. A. Frew, G. I. Orrock, R. M. Glen

The zinc flotation circuit was sampled to provide sized information on its metallurgical performance. A good balance was obtained and the roughing, scavenging, cleaning and regrind sections were assessed. Substantial losses of sphalerite occurred in all sizes. The limitations were poor recovery in the cleaning section which resulted in substantial recycling of 15-30µm sphalerite and iron sulphides, and inability to float +38µm sphalerite in the roughers. Regrinding increased sphalerite recovery by 7% with no loss in grade. Liberation measurements enabled balances for six size fractions to be calculated and the role of liberation on the metallurgical performance was assessed.

Jan 1, 1993

By S. E. Clay, P. R. Taylor

A physical model for the diffusion and flow of gases through porous solids, which accounts for the random nature of individual gas molecules moving through a solid of definite structure, has been formulated. The model was solved using' the Monte-Carlo technique. It was then used to evaluate specific constants related to the dusty gas model and to describe the gas-porous solid diffusion phenomena. Experimental results were used to validate the stochastic model.

Jan 1, 1988

By Priscilla P. Nelson, Steven D. Glaser, Thomas D. Rourke, O&apos

Construction records from six projects which employed full-face TBMs to drive 18 km of tunnel in sedimentary rock have been analyzed. More than twenty individual causes of delay could be identified. Delay causes are characterized on the basis of frequency and duration of incidents. Average utilization and downtime distributions are presented for each project, and frequency distributions of downtime per shift are discussed.

Jan 1, 1985

By R. Brough, T. K. Moller

There are differences in design aspects between steel and rubber linings in grinding mills. This paper describes the basic design rules for rubber liners for different grinding applications. When converting a mill from steel to rubber liners, the design must be changed from such familiar steel liner shapes as wedge bars and plates, wave liners, and ship-lap, to take advantage of the characteristics of rubber. Very little of the knowledge of the wear properties of steel can be used for the design of rubber mill liners.

Jan 1, 1990

By G. A. Goller, Y. C. Lo

Microscale studies involving an ultrafast load cell have been shown to provide direct and accurate measurements of particle strength, particle fracture energy and particle breakage functions under different loading geometry conditions. The effect of grinding media size, shape, density and surface properties on the energy efficiency can be quantitatively determined for different materials to be ground. The applications of microscale comminution studies have been demonstrated to provide good predictions of grinding mill performance with different grinding media.

Jan 1, 1995

By Henrie Henson, Dan Burroughs, Shyi-Shyong Jiang

Jan 1, 1993

By James A. Everts

Calcined bauxites are classified by their major end uses - abrasives and refractories. Target properties are dictated by application and processing requirements. The chemical and physical properties of premium grade calcined bauxites are far more stringent than metallurgical bauxite and this limits the sources and availability. Premium grade calcined bauxites are considered to be strategically critical to the industrialized countries of the world. Subject to disruptions in the key source countries, adequate supplies of premium grade calcined bauxites are anticipated in the foreseeable future.

Jan 1, 1984

By Mary-Lee Athorn, David A. Barratt

An opportunity to compare the performance of different tunnel boring machines (TBMs) operating in similar rock conditions occurred during the construction of a major water scheme in the UK. The principal objectives of this study were: (i) To collate, analyse and present the data available for the four TBM drives of the Kielder Aquaduct Scheme in terms of the tunnelling system performance and the downtime experienced, particularly where these were influenced or controlled by geotechnical parameters. (ii) To isolate the major sources of machine downtime and highlight those aspects of the tunnelling system that critically affect tunnelling progress rates (iii) To determine, by statistical techniques, relations between TBM performance and rock properties.

Jan 1, 1986

By D. Greene

The close integration of mine planning and mine operation continues to be the goal of mine operators. Depending upon the complexity, size and sophistication of the mine, limited success has been achieved in this area. Despite tremendous strides in the development of computer-aided mine planning, digital plans must usually be converted to error-prone paper maps and physical ground surveys for actual excavation and reclamation. However, advances in global positioning systems (GPSs), operator displays and mobile computers now enable equipment operators to work directly from on-board digital plans. A computer-aided earthmoving system (CAES) offers reduced survey costs, faster field transition time and improved excavation accuracy, coupled with faster, more informed decision making regarding key mining operations.

Jan 1, 2000

By A. A. Kornyshev, M. Burstein, S. T. Hall

The surface "roughness" of mineral particles has long been known to influence the fundamental process of particle-bubble attachment and other subprocesses in froth flotation. The physical nature of the surface of fine mineral particles can be analysed by determining their fractal geometry. A number of techniques are available to measure the fractal properties of mineral particles, these include gas adsorption, mercury porosimetry, neutron or X- ray scattering and image analysis. From the resultant Richardson plots or their Fourier-space analogs, the fractal dimension of flotation feed and product samples can be determined. Textural characteristics of particles have an influence on the stability of 3-phase flotation froths and the selectivity of recovery in the froth. Decrease of the equilibrium froth height for particles of higher fractal dimensions was experimentally established. The induction time of quartz particles of different fractal geometry has also been studied.

Jan 1, 1995