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The achievement of high availability of the Grey River Gold Mining Limited's alluvial gold dredge is a tortuous task which will rely upon the dedication of all staff employed at Grey River Gold Mining Limited (GRGML). The persistent adoption of new technology and better operating procedures, combined with a strong commitment to preventative and predictive maintenance, is necessary. The Grey River Gold Mining Limited alluvial gold dredge is operating in a relatively low grade alluvial gold deposit and hence relies on a high throughput of ore to be profitable. To achieve the required high material throughput the dredge incorporates an overburden removal system which operates simultaneously with a conventional bucketline system.   The overburden system incorporates a cutter wheel and suction pump configuration which is dedicated to removing the low grade (5 mg gold/m3 gravel) overburden. The bucketline conveys the richer grade payzone gravels (up to 890 mg/m3 gravel) to the recovery plant mounted onboard the dredge. The horizon for the overburden system approximates 15 m and the payzone terminates at the interface of the old man rock and the alluvial gravels at a variable depth averaging 22 m.   From a mechanical engineering perspective the dredge is a machine comprised of two materials handling systems which are controlled by Operations Staff and electronic process control systems.   The availability of such a materials handling system is a function of four variables: 1. The environment that the machine operates in. 2. The ability of the people operating the machine. 3. The design of the mechanisms, the configuration that they are grouped in and the effectiveness of the process control systems which control the mechanisms. 4. The procedures utilised to predict the performance of the machines and the skill of staff to analyse that data and carry out effective maintenance.

Jan 1, 1989

With the proving of a mineable orebody at Orlando in May 1961, Peko Mines N.L. was faced with the decision of whether to mill the ore on site or to haul it 25 miles to central facilities at Peko. Orlando was a relatively small orebody, so that it was decided to haul, although no reliable assessment of possible ore haulage costs was available.The necessity for a good haul road was recognised from the beginning and a 17 mile, 12 ft wide, single seal bitumen road was constructed, to link the mine to the Stuart Highway and Peko. The initial selection of 20 ton capacity diesel-powered end-tipping ore carts was made, with the best information available at the time.Since then some 130,000 tons of ore have been carted over a period of 3 years, and this paper presents the experiences of this haulage operation and the lessons learned.A second mine has just been brought into operation at Ivanhoe, 19 miles from Peko. For this haul it was decided to use an ore haulage vehicle of the side tipping road train type, which would cart some 70 tons, or more than three times the load of the vehicles initially selected.Only about 5,000 tons had been hauled at the date of this paper, but preliminary figures indicate a cost 01 1· 65d./ton-mile as against 2·47d. for the smaller vehicles.It would appear that the road haulage of ore from small outlying mines to a central plant can be highly economical, if certain basic rules concerning haul roads and vehicle selection are followed. This paper does not try to determine the maximum tonnages and haul distances which would finally make road hauling uneconomical...

Jan 1, 1966

By G. C. Tipper, A. P. Deane, A. G. Myers

SCHEME DESIGN London’s Heathrow Airport, as the world’s busiest international airport, is missing one vital aspect - a dedicated rail link which connects directly to the city. All this is about to change with the construction of Heathrow Express - a fast, high quality rail service between the airport and the centre of London. It was recognised in the mid 1980s that if Heathrow was to accommodate the forecast growth in passenger numbers and the resulting increase in road traffic, a dedicated airport rail service would be vital. The main access into the centre of Heathrow is via a road tunnel with a direct link to the M4 motorway. The airport has introduced a number of traffic management schemes, but these can only achieve so much benefit. Growth in air passenger traffic is predicted to continue at an average of 4% per annum well into the next century and it was clear that significant investment was needed. Heathrow Express at a cost of over £350 million will provide this when it starts its service in June 1998. The business case for the scheme is based on a rider ship of around 15% of air passenger traffic. The initial Heathrow Express service will be based on four trains per hour, up to 8 car train lengths, providing a high speed non-stop service between the airport and central London in just 16 minutes. Initially a joint venture between the British Railways Board and Heathrow Airport, by mutual consent of the two parties, Heathrow Airport recently purchased the British Railways Board share making this one of the largest private sector rail projects currently under construction in the UK. Leaving Paddington, the main rail terminus in West London, Heathrow Express trains will travel 12 miles on the newly electrified line to airport junction, north of the airport. At this point they will leave the mainline to enter a 5 mile tunnel section that runs underneath the heart of the airport. The railway companies are responsible for track work, signalling and electrification of the 12 mile main line section including a grade separated junction over the main tracks for the Great Western Railway which links London and South Wales. Heathrow Airport is re-

Jan 1, 1997

By Edmundo Tulcanaza

Increasing exploration costs and the need to reduce the time-frame from exploration to production presently demand formalized procedures to assist exploration planning and reserve analysis. Exploration planning is basically required to select the most cost-effective drilling/sampling program, and to flag the needs for data of greater relevance and reliability. Reserve analysis is necessary to determine the sensitivity of grade-tonnage relations, and to clarify the economic implications of mining when alternative technical choices are to be considered.

Jan 1, 1982

By Jerry B. F. Champlin

The successful injection of liquids into subsurface permeable formations for production stimulation, storage, or waste disposal requires a rapid, precise, and accurate method of determining the permeability of porous solids. This report describes a method and apparatus, developed by the Bureau of Mines, that use the principle of specific-volume permeametry. Calibration of the apparatus over a wide range of permeabilities and standardization of several apparatus constants have eliminated many of the tedious calculations and problems of manipulation common to some other methods. Improvements in reproducibility and accuracy have resulted from reducing experimental measurements to one parameter--time. Specific permeabilities of reservoir rock samples are determined directly from a chart that relates elapsed time to a permeability equivalent to that determined by bubble-tube measurements.

Jan 1, 1962

By Adrian Brown

Pilot Hole ?X? was drilled to test the formations through which the ventilation shaft for the proposed U.S.B.M. demonstration oil shale mine will be drilled. Five permeability tests were performed at various stratigraphic levels within this hole. The test method used was that of pumping fluids out of the hole for three hours, using the air lift method, followed by a three-hour period where the recharge was observed. Transmissivity and permeability results were determined from these test data. The test procedure used is described and supporting data for the hydrologic tests are provided.

Jan 1, 1977

By T X. Le, H T. Tran, K Zaw, T Manaka

"An EXTENDED ABSTRACT is available for download. A full-length paper was not prepared for this presentation. The Truong Son fold-thrust belt (TSFTB) is a prominent tectonic component of mainland Indochina that occurs as a north-west–south-east-trending tectonic entity that extends from north-eastern Laos, straddles the Laos-Vietnam border area and is submerged under the sea basin in east central Vietnam. The TSFTB hosts numerous regional-scale gold and polymetallic base metal deposits, and the mineralisation occurs along the strike of the belt; however, the potential of many of these deposits are inadequately evaluated. The ore mineralisation is hosted by different rock assemblages, including highly metamorphosed Late Proterozoic metasedimentary rocks and Palaeozoic sedimentary and/or volcanic packages, which were intruded by several phases of magma and underwent a number of tectonic events. Several ore-forming styles – including porphyry, Carlin-type and sediment-hosted orogenic Au – were formed during at least two phases of regional thermotectonism that have been identified in the TSFTB. However, all of the major gold deposits/mineralisations are closely related to region-wide structural breaks and many of them are controlled by large-scale, high-strain zones. The fold-thrust structures in the TSFTB therefore play important roles for regional gold mineralisation and metallogeny.CITATION:Tran, H T, Zaw, K, Le, T X and Manaka, T, 2015. Structural controls on gold mineralisation in the south-eastern Truong Son fold-thrust belt and its significance in regional metallogeny, in Proceedings PACRIM 2015 Congress, pp 521–530 (The Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy: Melbourne)."

Mar 18, 2015

By Fred Morelko, Michael Connelly, Brad L. Ricks

INTRODUCTION The $1.1 billion Bajo la Alumbrera Project, started up in 1997 by Minera Alumbrera Limited in the Catamarca Province of Northwestern Argentina, is the first large scale modern mining project to be developed in Argentina. Like many modern Andean mining projects, existing infrastructure was not available to economically transport the 875,000 tonnes of product per year. A variety of alternatives were investigated, including upgrading of existing roads and railroads, slurry pipelines, and combinations of these systems. The final system selected was to combine a 312 km slurry pipeline with an 820 km rail haul to a ship loading facility near Rosario. The concentrate pipeline crosses divergent terrain between the minesite at 2400 m elevation and the filter plant at 400 m elevation. The system selected represented the lowest net present cost alternative by a significant margin. BACKGROUND The Bajo Alumbrera deposit was discovered in 1947 by Professor Cetioni from the University of Tucuman. It is a large (>750 million tonnes) medium-grade (0.6%) copper deposit with high gold values (0.5 g/t*). The deposit outcrops, making it very suitable to modern, large scale, open pit mining techniques using 218 t trucks and 43 m3 shovels. Advances in gravity concentration of the gold helped to demonstrate the feasibility of the project in a study prepared by Fluor Daniel for Minera Alumbrera in 1994. The initial concentrator is the largest green-field concentrator ever constructed, rated at 85,000 t/d. Production will peak at 190,000 tonnes of copper metal and 710,000 troy ounces of gold per year, one of the top 10 copper and top 15 gold producers in the world. * Throughout this paper, the word tonne and abbreviation refer to the metric ton of 1000 kg.

Jan 1, 1998

By Martin B. Hudson, Daniel Brescia, Zhangwei Ning

Due to the complexity and sensitivity of surrounding environments, instrumentation and monitoring (I&M) is critical for many urban deep excavations. The objects to be monitored include shoring bulkheads, retained embankments, adjacent buildings and roads as well as underground utilities. However, there are also plenty of constraints on the implementation of I&M such as: congested site space, difficult access to instruments, coordination among multiple contractors, and installation permits for private or public properties. Because of these constraints, sometimes the implementation of the initially planned I&M is delayed, its scope is reduced, and/or the continuity of monitoring is interrupted. For these reasons, it is important to implement the I&M with robust and redundant capabilities while providing minimal interference to the project construction and schedule. This paper describes state-of-the-art I&M technologies including automatic motorized total station (AMTS) with camera and automatic leveling device, reflectorless AMTS and IoT- based wireless sensors based on a case study of an on-going deep excavation project. INTRODUCTION In urban environments, deep excavations requiring the construction of temporary shoring bulkheads are becoming increasingly common, with the associated need to provide protection of the surrounding built environment during construction. Protection of the surrounding environment requires planning, engineering, construction, monitoring, and excessive shoring movement mitigation. The I&M is a vital component of the deep shoring implementation. In public projects, geotechnical I&M is often placed within the general contractor’s scope, whereas the majority of deep excavations are privately undertaken. For those private developments, sometimes the developer contracts the geotechnical I&M directly with the project geotechnical engineer or by a geotechnical I&M specialist hired by the project geotechnical engineer. In either the public project or private development case, the effective deployment of the I&M system relies heavily on coordination and collaboration with the project contractor.

Jan 1, 2018

By C. E. Jordan

The Bureau of Mines is conducting research into the pneumatic recovery of coarse mica and has used this method to produce mica concentrates that contain more than 90 percent mica. This research is being carried out pursuant to the Bureau's objective to develop technology that will help maintain an adequate supply of minerals and metals to meet national economic and strategic needs. Researchers used a Bureau-designed system of crushers, screens, and zig-zag air classifiers to concentrate coarse liberated mica particles from mica-bearing materials. This pneumatic system was used to concentrate four mica ores from Arizona, North Carolina, and South Dakota and three waste tailings from Alabama, Georgia, and South Dakota. Using these samples, it was demonstrated that plus 65-mesh size mica can be effectively recovered by the pneumatic method. Not only were the concentrates high in mica content; it was also demonstrated that this method can be used to recover up to 78 percent of the mica that was originally contained in the samples. Because it is a dry concentration method, the pneumatic beneficiation technique may be advantageous in areas where water resources are limited.

Jan 1, 1980

The application of modifying factors to the Merensky Reef and UG2 Chromitite Layer has a number of challenging aspects as the deposits are tabular and consist of a number of separate geological entities that are grade bearing. The important aspects of the conversion include mineral holdings, dilution with grade bearing material, mining and geological losses, marginal cut offs and recoveries especially where open pit or weathered material is being considered. It is considered inappropriate to add material for dilution at zero grade as the associated material generally comes with an associated low grade. The Merensky Reef Is typically a pegmatoidal feldspathic pyroxenite with bounding chromitite layers. The Merensky Reef is senso stricto too narrow to be considered as a mineable entity and therefore any reserve must include material at low or marginal grades. This is further complicated as the typical mine cut or approach varies across a mine of project. This variation must be included in the mineral reserve conversion. The UG2 Chromitite Layer is typically lithologically bounded i.e. chromitite hosted. However, this adds interesting aspects particularly where leaders are intersected in the hangingwall. These can contribute to unstable hangingwall. It may be considered appropriate to include these in the mineral reserve. One of the overarching principles is that the reserve can be demonstrates to be feasible i.e. can be mined at a profit. Here aspects of a feasibility including infrastructure (power, water etc) needs to be properly considered. The paper will attempt to describe these and other relevant issues and highlight examples from experience together with proposed solutions.

Jan 1, 2007

By L Ventura, M Almond

The Pueblo Viejo project in the Dominican Republic installed an innovative sample system on its reverse circulation (RC) drilling rig during commissioning and subsequent commencement of operations. As knowledge of the orebody increased with mining and plant production, cost pressures became apparent that raised questions concerning the continued use of RC drilling versus blasthole sampling for ore control.To justify the continued use of RC drilling for grade control, an in-depth study was undertaken to determine the quality of the sample and prove its value-add to the operation.To investigate the differences in sample quality, a complete bench trial was initiated across both ore pits to compare RC drill results with blasthole assays on a side-by-side basis. The results indicated that based on ore block comparison between RC and blasthole sampling, RC identified an additional 20 per cent of high-grade (+ 4.5 g/t Au) ounces.Previous work indicated that Au, Ag and Cu were all elevated in the drill fines at Pueblo Viejo (Goers and Almond, 2012). This previous test work did not consider the quantity of fines in an RC sample therefore new test work was undertaken to include particle size distribution analyses. This study would determine if the inclusion of fines in the sample was occurring and compare the quantity of fines in the sample against other sample systems and blasthole samples.Comparisons between RC samples and blasthole samples indicate that for the RC samples a range of 30–35 per cent of the sample passed 300 mesh as compared to blastholes where the range of the sample passing 300 mesh was 15–30 per cent.This paper includes a case study on the importance of accurate samples and how they have impacted throughput through the pressure oxidation process plant at Pueblo Viejo. The accurate samples provided by RC allow for improved stockpile and blending strategies, showing the importance of accurate samples to manage risk and create value, against the perception that savings can be made at the risk of poor sampling performance.CITATION:Almond, M and Ventura, L, 2017. Adding value with reverse circulation drilling at Pueblo Viejo, in Proceedings Tenth International Mining Geology Conference 2017, pp 277–284 (The Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy: Melbourne).

Sep 20, 2017

By R. W. Baker

"The development of uppers drilling at Brunswick Mining is reviewed. This paper describes design criteria for drilling patterns and the research required for selection of a suitable drill jumbo. The success of the uppers drilling program based on operating procedures is highlighted. IntroductionBrunswick Mining and Smelting Corporation Ltd., operates a 10 500 tonnes per day lead /zinc/copper I silver underground mine some seventeen miles southwest of Bathurst, New Brunswick .The No. 12 orebody, first discovered in 1952 by a group headed by M.J. Boylen, had extensive development, including two shallow shafts (500 ft), and test work carried out on it by St. Joe Lead between 1953-1957. However due to complex metallurgy and depressed metal prices, the operation was suspended.In 1961, a group comprised of M.J . Boylen, K.C . Irving and Patino acquired the rights of St. Joe Lead to the No. 12 property. A concerted development plan was initiated along with construction of the necessary sur face facilities and by July 1964, the property was in production at 4500 tons per day.In 1967 Noranda Mines Ltd. acquired operating control of Brunswick Mining and Smelting Corporation Ltd."

Jan 1, 1988

NEW MEMBERS The following list comprises the names of those persons who became members during the period of Feb. 10, 1918, to Mar 10, 1918. ADKINSON, HENRY M., Min. Engr Walker Bank Bldg., Salt Lake City, Utah. BARKE, A. C., Min. Engr., United States Smelt., Refin. & Min. Exploration Co., 1503 Hobart, Bldg., San Francisco, Cal. BARKER, F. L., Prof. of Min. and Geol., Pei Yang University, Tientsin, China. BEASLEY, ALFRED F., Supt. Of Refinery, Bunker Hill & Sullivan Min. & Cone. Co., Kellogg, Idaho. BEEKLY, A. L Chief Geol., Cosden & Co., Tulsa, Okla. BELLIS, ARTHUR E Met., N. E. Westinghouse Co., Springfield, Mass. BRAIN, ELMER C Mgr., United Gold. Min. Co., Granite, Ore. BRUNER, CRANE S., Engr., American Zinc, Lead & Smelting Co., Carterville, Mo. COLLINS,. HARRY R Mech. Engr., Fuller Engineering Co., Allentown, Pa. CRANKSHAW, ALDEN, Experimental Met., New Jersey Zinc Co. (of Pa.), Palmerton, Pa. GALLIGAN, EMMET F., Mine Supt., Homestead-Iron Dyke Mines Co., Inc., Homestead, Ore. GREENE, FRANK C Geol., Cosden Oil & Gas .Co., Tulsa, Okla. HALSEY, HOWARD G Field Engr., 0. M. Bilharz Min. Co., Miami, Okla. HARROUN, DOUGLASS HOUGHTON, Supt.., Aguascalientes Metal Co., Asientos, Aguascalientes, Mexico.

Jan 4, 1918

By Gordon Irons, Kevin Graham, Krishnakumar Krishnapisharody

Ladle or secondary metallurgy in steelmaking is an essential process step for the production of high-quality steel. Professor David Robertson was a pioneer in the modeling of these processes, in particular gas-metal fluid dynamic interactions and the rates of slag-metal reactions. This is now a highly active area of research, and some of the recent developments in this area will be reviewed.

Jan 1, 2014

By Richard Klimpel

A common problem in mineral processing and chemical engineering is the need to estimate flow rates and/or weight ratios involved with engineering operations for which it is inherently difficult to directly measure stream weights. Simple examples of this situation include stream separators (a classifier operating on a particle flow) and stream mixers (the mixing of new feed and circulating load in a ball mill circuit). Often in these types of operations, it is possible to sample the streams involved to get approximate component analyses (e.g. size distributions of solid streams, chemical composition of chemical streams). In this paper various formulae are developed which can be used to estimate stream flow rates or weight ratios given information on the stream components. The type and level of experimental error present in the stream component analyses does have an important bearing on the numerical values (and reliability) of the weight ratios calculated by the various formulae. A simple but theoretically sound method is shown for selecting appropriate estimation formulae for any given engineering operation. The derived formulae are applied to sets of experimental classification data for illustration purposes.

Jan 1, 1979

By J. G. Pippenger

The Coteau Properties Company's Freedom Mine is a surface lignite mining operation located near Beulah, North Dakota. Coteau, a wholly owned subsidiary of The North American Coal Corporation, produces more than 13.5 million tonnes per year, ranking it among the largest mines in North America. In 1993, Coteau ranked seventh in terms of annual coal sales, becoming the largest mine outside the Powder River Basin of northeastern Wyoming. However, for the Freedom Mine to stand among these Powder River heavyweights, Coteau over-came several obstacles, including a coal seam with three quarters the heating value and overburden to coal ratios three times higher than the Powder River mines. Coteau's ability to compete has been built around a program of continuous productivity improvement, cost efficiency, and innovation. This report highlights a few of the major improvements implemented in recent years.

Jan 1, 1995

By Bo Westerberg, Mattias Andersson, Yvonne Rogbeck

"Deep stabilisation has been used in Sweden for decades. The method has been improved to allow it to be used in different types of soils and with new binders. One challenging soil type in Sweden is so-called sulphide soil, a fine-grained soil which contains organic material and iron sulphides. There have been some cases in Sweden of problems when using deep stabilisation in this type of soil, and in one case a slope failure occurred. This paper shows that it is possible to achieve good results with deep stabilisation in sulphide soils. Laboratory and field studies from a test site along the Botniabanan railway line in Sweden are presented. Geotechnical and chemical properties of the natural soil were investigated in the laboratory and one or more of these properties may explain the differences in the stabilising effect of sulphide soils. The strength of the laboratory samples and the columns in the field were tested and compared. It is shown that a satisfactory stabilisation effect can be achieved with the proper choice of binder, amount of binder added, curing time and mixing energy. In sulphide soils, more binder additive is needed than in “ordinary” inorganic clays.1. INTRODUCTIONThe term sulphide soils is used in this paper to refer to the unique types of sulphide soil commonly found in the coastal areas along the north-eastern coastline of Sweden between the cities of Gävle and Haparanda, a distance of about 900 km. Sulphide soils are in general very compressible, susceptible to creep deformation and normally show low undrained shear strength. A sulphide soil may have a negative environmental impact through acidification and chemical action if it is subjected to oxygen, for example during excavation or lowering of the ground water table, Mácsik (1999). In foundation engineering works, efforts are made, for environmental or/and economic reasons, to use the sulphide soil as the foundation instead of excavating it. Deep stabilisation by means of columns is a potential method for use when sulphide soil needs to be improved in order to reduce settlements or/and increase the stability of embankments.Sulphide soils were formed as sediments at river mouths and off the coast in the special environment prevailing at the time of sedimentation, Mácsik (1994). The water in which the sulphide soil was sedimented was brackish/sweet and the environment was typically deficient in oxygen. The environment prevented complete decomposition of the organic material in the sediments. As a result, sulphide soils were formed primarily in the form of a fine-grained composition of clay and silt minerals, iron sulphides and organic matter. Such environments still exist today and new sulphide soil sediments continue to be formed."

Jan 1, 2015

By R. T. DeWoody, J. W. Chester, W. C. Miller

The work was done to develop a relatively efficient muffler for quieting the exhaust of a rock drill . The exhaust of a pneumatic rock drill is the source of the major part of the noise generated by the drill . The exhaust noise can be reduced in a number of different ways , but this study involved only reactive mufflers . The reactive muffler can be simulated by an electrical circuit . Information obtained from analogous electrical circuits was used to design an efficient exhaust muffler for pneumatic rock drills . Electrical analogies proved to be a valuable tool in the design of mufflers .

Jan 1, 1964

By I. Southern, S. Kelebek

"Smelting furnace bricks contain significant quantity of base metals trapped in refractory material. A series of flotation tests were carried out on samples of old bricks from Sudbury area to examine upgrading behaviour for recycling purposes. Depending on the grind size used nickel recoveries varied from 60 to 90.6% with corresponding grades of 20% and 14.7%Ni. There is a trade-off between nickel and copper. The nickel has responded well to fine grinding, however, the copper recovery suffered from it. Mineralogical characteristics and flotation behaviour of the brick material are discussed in reference to those from the primary ore. INTRODUCTIONMineral processing is well recognized as a mature technology not only for the mining industry, but also for the environmental industry for the purpose of remediation and recycling. Materials available for recycling are usually the products of many years ago. There are multiple stake holders in this area. In general, when the processing results in a product that can be reused or sold, the company carrying out the remediation makes a profit, while the regulators and the public are pleased due to a cleaner environment. From these points of view, there have been many papers published over the years on various mineral processing techniques applied to separation of many different materials including from mining and metallurgical industries (Wilson et al., 1994; Tsunekawa et al., 2005; Saikia et al., 2012).Flotation may be viewed as the backbone of the mining and metallurgical industry since its invention for separation of solids from one another almost a century ago. It is capable of recovering a variety of finely divided different solids following their liberation from each other. Its versatility and highly competitive nature in terms of cost per tonne of material processed, accounts for its occasional uses in the environment engineering area. In the mining industry, flotation is the standard method used for the sulphide ores. It can be applied as a bulk flotation and/or differential flotation. Bulk flotation, which refers to co-flotation of several components from their source, is most suitable for environmental cleanup objectives. Desulphurisation of various plant tailings is a typical example of this (Benzazzoua et al., 2000)."

Jan 1, 2012