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By Chen Feng

Compared to widespread successful deployment of robotic manipulators for repetitive and hazardous tasks in related industries such as manufacturing, the construction industry has achieved relatively limited benefits from robotics and soft automation. Unlike manufacturing, where robotic solutions benefit from the structured layout of the environment (e.g., factory assembly line), construction robots face unique challenges that arise from the rugged, dynamic, and unstructured environment of the work site, as well as the uncertainty and evolving sequence of occurring on-site events. This challenges any intended construction robots to not only replicate basic human motion, but also be capable of sensing and adapting to environmental changes, and making decisions based on the evolving state of the environment. Building upon recent advancements in robotic mapping, computer vision, and object recognition, the authors propose to introduce autonomous behavior at the basic task level for on-site construction robots to address these challenges in a flexible and extensible manner. This paper reports the outcome of the first phase of this research - a structured methodology for improved design and development of basic task automations - and focuses on algorithms developed for mobile robot navigation and relative pose estimation. The algorithms are implemented on a prototype mobile robotic platform, and evaluated in several experimental scenarios.

Aug 1, 2013

By Robin Burgess-Limerick

The introduction of automation to mining has great potential to reduce safety and health risks by removing people from hazardous situations. However, automation changes the tasks performed by people and may introduce new tasks. For the system to function optimally, these tasks must be designed taking human abilities and limitations into account. Humansystems integration refers to systems engineering processes that ensure that human-related issues are adequately considered during system planning, design, development, and evaluation. During procurement of automated systems, a human-systems integration program plan should be prepared that describes the human-systems integration activities that will be performed to address each of the six core domains of human-systems integration: staffing, personnel, training, human factors engineering, safety, and health.

Jun 16, 2020

By O. W. Walvoord

ONE particular plant has been chosen to illustrate the various factors in mill design. The problems are general in nature and with various modifications are met in the design of most milling plants. Literature on modern mill design is not extensive and certainly has not kept pace with the rapid advancement in the art of ore beneficiation. Much remains to be investigated, and continued vigilance is required to give the operator and the metallurgist the best layout to meet the industry's changing requirements. The Humboldt project, a joint venture of the Cleveland-Cliffs Iron Co. and the Ford Motor Co., involves an iron ore flotation plant near the town of Humboldt, on the Marquette range of the Michigan Upper Peninsula. A crushing plant, designed for an ultimate capacity of 720 long tons per hr, is followed by a first mill unit of 70 long tons per hr. Future mill units are planned to bring the total mill capacity to 5000 long tons per 24 hr.

Jan 1, 1954

By Jorge Barrios, Milagros Tuni

La búsqueda de nuevos métodos y formas para controlar la polución en cada proceso del ciclo minero es un trabajo continuo y que lleva a una mejora con el tiempo debido a la aparición de nueva tecnología. En el presente trabajo se muestra cómo la utilización de la unidad de supresión móvil (USM) de polvo; no se limita a la mitigación de la polución en el proceso de la descarga del material fragmentado desde los camiones mineros hacia los depósitos de desmonte, sino que también humecta adecuadamente las vías de acarreo de equipos de gran tonelaje que cuentan con aplicación de aditivos supresores de polvo.

Sep 29, 2023

By Guihong Han, Wei Wang, Chaolei Lv, Yongsheng Zhang

Silica aerogels are promising in many applications because of their excellent properties. However, the real applications of pure silica aerogels are limited because of their fragile network structure. We have prepared silica aerogel composites using humic acid as a composite material for improving the performance of silica aerogels and valorization of humic acid. The silica hydrogel composite was prepared using sodium silicate as a precursor and humic acid as a composite material by acid-base catalysis and sol-gel method. The hydrogel was followed by freeze-drying to obtain composite aerogel. The microstructures, specific surface area, and functional groups of silica and composite aerogel were characterized using scanning electron microscope (SEM), brunauer-emmett-teller (BET) and fourier transform infrared spectrometer (FTIR). The results demonstrated that the specific surface area of the silica composite aerogel was 307 m2/g under the condition of pH at 6, the mass ratio of silicon to humic acid (HA) at 3.82 and the molar ratio of N, N-dimethylformamide (DMF) to silicon at 0.9. X-ray diffraction (XRD) showed that the silica (composite) aerogels were amorphous. Thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) revealed that the silica aerogels lost weight from 150 to 250 °C and humic acid decomposed between 350 and 500 °C, and then the mass of the sample remained stable.

Mar 1, 2018

By Raymond Dallaire

The Humphrey's spiral is a static gravity separation device which cannot be adjusted to match short-term variations that occur in the feed. Any disturbance in the feed grade, per cent solids or flow rate affects substantially the recovery and grade of concentrate. Such variations must be minimized in order to maintain the desired rate of production and quality of the product for which the installation has been designed. A study has been performed in which the foregoing assertions were quantified. The feed grade, per cent solids, flow rate and particle size were varied independently. Ore from Carol Lake, Nfld., was used throughout the experiments. This consisted of specular hematite and magnetite in a silica gangue.

Jan 1, 1978

By M. R. Geer, H. F. Yancey

Four coals were treated in the Humphreys spiral concentrator, and the products were examined by float-and-sink and screen-sizing tests to determine fundamental performance characteristics. The efficiency of the separation between coal and impurity was shown to be influenced greatly by particle size.

Jan 1, 1950

By Whitman E. Brown

The installation in 1948 of a Humphrey spiral concentrator section at the Hill-Trumbull plant of The Cleveland-Cliffs Iron Co. is the latest commercial method on the Mesabi Range being used for the recovery of fine iron ore. In two stages of concentration 84 spirals treat approximately 120 long tons per hour of minus 1/8 in. ore. These spirals augment the production of the heavy-density plant which recovers the plus 44 in. iron from the plant crude ore. Structure of the ore is such that, when crushed, about 50 pct of the plant crude is minus 1/8 in. size. After desliming in a 66 in. Akins classifier, grinding the classifier product in a ball mill and again desliming in a 78 in. Akins classifier about 15 pct of the crude ore remains to be treated in the spiral plant.

Jan 1, 1949

By C. F. Gleeson, D. G. Sheehan

"The results of humus and overburden geochemical surveys over the Doyon, Bousquet and Page-Williams gold ore deposits are presented.These studies show that humus sampling for gold gives negative results over the Doyon deposit. The lack of response is probably caused by the presence of 1 m of relatively impermeable glaciolacustrine clay and silt that overlies 1 m to 2 m of till over the surface expression of the ore zone. By contrast, positive responses for gold occur in humus samples over the Page Williams A and C gold deposits. The ""A"" ore zone is covered by several metres of exotic calcareous till over 0.5 m to 1 m of older, locally derived till. Anomalous values for gold in humus range from 10 to 35 ppb over the orebody. Overburden over the ""C"" ore zones is much thinner, generally it consists of less than 2 m of sandy till. Trenching humus anomalies that range from 10 to 1360ppb Au uncovered the gold mineralization. The geochemical dispersal trains in till from the Doyon orebody and the Page-Williams ""A"" zone are relatively short (i.e. less than 200 m) because both deposits occur in the lee of bedrock highs that shielded them from extensive glacial quarrying. Dispersal trains from all three pyritic gold deposits can be defined using either the fine fraction or heavy mineral fraction of the till.The intensity of the gold in till anomalies over the ore zones is variable. Therefore, it would be misleading to attach rigid significant threshold gold values to overburden drilling results. Each case must be evaluated based on bedrock topography, sample density, overburden type, thickness of till, as well as size, type and orientation of the target exposed to glacial erosion."

Jan 1, 1987

By Frigyes Egerer, Pál Bárczy

Introduction Charles III, Holy Roman Emperor and King of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy, established one of the first mining schools in Europe on June 22, 1735, in Selmecbanya (Schemnitz in German and Banska Stiavmica in Slovakian). The old city, built around the ancient gold mines, is shown in a contemporary engraving in Fig. 1. Charles' historical decree consisted of 13 chapters and included: the deed of foundation, the definition of grants, instruction for educational policy and curriculum, disciplinary rules, and the appointment of personnel. The first professor of the school, Samuel Mikoviny, gave his first lecture the same year, in December 1735. The 250th anniversary of the establishment of the School of Mines was celebrated Sept. 2-4, 1985, in Miskolc. It was attended by representatives of other Hungarian and of several foreign technical universities. A silver medallion (Fig. 2) was issued to commemorate the occasion and a series of lectures

Jan 6, 1986

"Australia’s largest rail freight network operator, the Australian Rail Track Corporation (ARTC), has selected GE Transportation’s Movement Planner solution as the key technology enabler for its Hunter Valley-focused network control optimization program.ARTC’s Newcastle-based network control, is the nerve center of Hunter Valley rail operations, where locally based train control professionals make thousands of decisions every day to safely support the annual movement of more than 24 kt/h (26,400 stph) of freight, and tens of thousands of coal, freight, grain and passenger trains each year.ARTC plans to transform its train control function by integrating and then building on Movement Planner, an advanced software solution by GE Transportation that provides real-time rail traffic planning and optimization to enable freight to move more efficiently. “The Hunter Valley rail network is one of the busiest and most complex in the country, supporting the largest coal export port in the world,” ARTC managing director and chief executive officer John Fullerton said.“As bulk freight demands grow, rail operators like ARTC and supply chains like the Hunter Valley coal network need to be creative in the way they respond so the Australian economy doesn’t miss out. That’s why we have conducted a worldwide search to find globally proven solutions that will improve our network productivity and efficiency,” Fullerton said.The Movement Planner solution considers multiple factors including train schedules, trafficcontrol systems and train movements relative to each other and then develops an optimized traffic plan for the trains throughout the network. Existing GE customers have benefited from increased visibility of network operations, higher velocity, less dwell times, and improved on-time performance across their networks."

Jan 1, 2018

The first neutrinos in nature ever detected by man were "caught" in a unique laboratory some 3 km (over 2 miles) underground in one of the world's deepest mine shafts at East Rand Proprietary Mines (ERPM), Boksburg. Only 100 m from where gold is being mined from the rock face a small team of South African and American physicists work on one of the most fascinating and important fundamental research projects that is currently exciting the imagination of the scientific world. Neutrinos are sub-atomic particles just as are protons, neutrons and electrons, but they are unique in that they have neither electric charge nor mass. Cosmic neutrinos travel at the speed of light and penetrate stars and planets. Even a million kilometres of solid lead would not provide a satisfactory shield against them. Stars are believed to "burn" by means of nuclear reactions which produce enormous fluxes of neutrinos. The sun, for example, illuminates the earth with visible light, but also bathes it with neutrinos. After World War II, two American physicists, Profs Frederick Reines and Clyde Cowan, experimenting at a large nuclear reactor, succeeded in obtaining direct evidence of the existence of the laboratory-produced neutrino. It then became very important to establish whether neutrinos also existed in nature. This knowledge would lead to a greater understanding of the forces of nuclear physics, of the behaviour of nuclear particles and, indeed, is also relevant to astrophysics. From the start it was clear that the search for "natural" neutrinos would be difficult. Questions which arose were- * how could they be traced if they were without mass or electric charge? * how could other nuclear particles be screened off? * could these not be wrongly detected, or even prevent accurate detection of neutrinos? Neutrinos were known to be produced along with charged particles, by the reaction of primary cosmic rays with the constituents of the atmosphere. It was also known that when the neutrinos collided with matter, they themselves produced the same type of charged particle which could be detected if the unwanted charged particles from the atmosphere could be screened off. What was needed, therefore, was a laboratory where the particles produced in the atmosphere could be screened out, yet which would receive and detect the particles produced by the neutrons' collision with the matter (solid rock) in the vicinity of the laboratory. This meant that scientists either had to build a laboratory with an enormously thick lead shield for their detection work. . . or they could go as near as possible to the centre of the earth where only charged nuclear particles of the very highest energies could penetrate. ERPM was clearly the most suitable place in the world where so effective a "neutrino trap" could be set. Under more than 3 000 m of solid rock the apparatus for detecting neutrinos is well shielded against unwanted nuclear particles produced in the cosmic radiation which can reach the laboratory only in a steeply vertical trajectory. Other particles are easily stopped by the great thickness of rock. The air-conditioned laboratory is at one end of a 150 m long tunnel, 2,5 m high and wide, blasted from the rock. The electronic recording equipment is housed here, while the rest of the tunnel is filled with the detection system. When a charged particle passes through a detector element, it produces a minute flash of light which is recorded and which triggers a flash-tube array. This then defines the trajectory of the charged particle, which is also recorded on film for analysis. So far 82 neutrinos have been detected, 50 at the present level and 32 at a higher level, and the findings have borne out the physicists' theoretical expectations. In this joint project Profs Reines, J. P. F. Sellschop, Director of the Witwatersrand University's Nuclear Research Unit and M. F. Crouch of the Case-Western Reserve University of Ohio are the Chief Investigators. This unique endeavour has been made possible by financial support from the US Atomic Energy Commission, the University of the Witwatersrand and the Chamber of Mines of South Africa, as well as by the cooperation of the management and men of ERPM.

By Gilles Carrière

"The Huntingdon mine of Quebec Copper Corporation is situated 3 miles south of the village of Eastman, in the Eastern Townships of Quebec. The copper deposit consists of several pyrrhotite-chalcopyrite replacement bodies or bands.The first mining operations on the conspicuous surface gossan of the Huntingdon deposit started in 1865. They were suspended in 1883. The .mine was again active from 1890 to 1893 and from 1912 to 1924. These operations were carried to a depth of 500 feet, and it is estimated that some 150,000 tons of ore were extracted, of a grade reported as varying between 3 Yi and 7 per cent copper.In 1950 a program of exploration was initiated in the area of the old mine, and resulted in the finding of 500,000 tons of ore with a grade of 2 per cent copper. A new shaft was sunk to a depth of 1,160 feet, and by February 1954 the mine was extracting 800 tons of ore daily.General Geology and StructureThe mineralized zones are on the west side of a band of altered volcanic rock, locally called andesite, adjacent to a sill-like body of serpentinized peridotite which lies west of the andesite. The bands of andesite and serpentine extend several miles north and south of the mine. Their strike is generally north 15 degrees east, and they dip steeply east. Their widths vary very considerably along the strike, but in the mine area each is about 450 feet wide on surface. They are enclosed in sediments of the Caldwell series, consisting of greywackes, quartzites, slates, and shales. The andesite belongs to the same series, which is thought to be of Cambrian age (1). The ultrabasic intrusive is post-Ordovician.At p\aces along the serpentine contact the andesite shows a pronounced schistosity; it is parallel to the contact and rarely extends farther than a hundred feet from it. No evidence of strong folding or faulting has been found so far in the mine workings. Some apparent distortions and irregularities in the strike of the contact may all be due to the intrusive nature of the serpentine. In the mine area, transgressive tongues of serpentine point southward in the andesite.A few vertical lamprophyre dykes, not more than five feet thick, cut the other formations at right angles."

Jan 1, 1949

By James A. Robertson

"In the Blind River area Proterozoic clastic and sedimentary rocks and minor volcanic rocks (The Huronian Supergroup) uncomformably overlie and trangress northwards over dominantly granitic Archean terrane (2500 + Ma) and are intruded by Nipissing Diabase (2ll5 Ma). Later deformation and metamorphic events are recognized. The developing depositional basin was controlled by the incipient Great Lakes Tectonic Zone marginal to the Algoman Craton.The Matinenda Formation (basal Huronian) comprises northwards-derived fluvial arkose, quartzite, and pyritic, uraniferous oligomictic conglomerate which contained in 1981 some two-thirds of Canada's uranium resources. Production to December 1981 from Elliot Lake totalled 98.3 thousand tonnes U for an average recovered grade of 0.1% U with an additional 671 tonnes U recovered by leaching at Agnew Lake. The remaining resources are at lower grades. Some thorium and yttrium have been produced. Minor amounts of gold reflect the paucity in the source area. Gold is better-developed in the Huronian north of Sudbury reflecting the local source area.The conglomerate beds lie in southeasterly-striking zones controlled by basement topography down sedimentation from uraniferous Archean granite. Uraninite textures, the distribution of monazite, and local enrichment by reworking indicate a syngenetic, probably placer, origin of the mineralization. ""Brannerite"" has formed by solution of uranium from the margins of the uraninite grains and redeposition on the original titaniferous minerals. Penecontemporaneous volcanics may have been a source for sulphur in some of the pyrite and of trace amounts of Co, Ni and Au. Some pyrite may be detrital, some may be authigenic and some introduced.Drab coloured rocks, uranium and sulphide mineralization, the presence of hydrocarbon (thucholite) and a post-Archean regolith formed under reducing conditions have been cited as evidence of an early Precambrian reducing environment extended to the atmosphere. Sedimentary features indicating fast-flowing water and possibly a cold climate imply that the uraninite would be exposed to whatever oxygen was present in the atmosphere under conditions which would inhibit complete solution. In the upper Huronian, red beds and in the Lorrain Formation a monazite - iron oxide assemblage and copper mineralization indicate more oxidizing conditions. . Similar uranium deposits occur at Agnew Lake and in the basal Huronian north of Sudbury there are minor uranium and gold values.Provenance, lack of complete oxidation, transportation and depositional processes, redistribution during diagenesis and possibly low grade metamorphism, and the lack of post-depositional destructive processes are the dominant factors in the formation and preservation of the ores. The modified placer theory of genesis is well entrenched and an exploration model for such deposits throughout the world is well-documented.Research continues on mineralogy and textures of the ores, detailed sedimentology of the ores and their host rocks, with particular emphasis on: provenance area, the influence of early Precambrian mineralization patterns on the mineralization present in the Huronian both in space and in time, fluvial sedimentation and diagenesis. Expansion and reopening of the mines of the Elliot Lake camp should facilitate further studies."

Jan 1, 1986

By Hingant Pierre

The Hurtières Tunnel was built in 1995 with drill and blast method, in metamorphic schist. It is located between Lyon and Torino on the A 43 motorway in the French Alps. During the construction, a geological hazard was encountered, which caused a massive ground collapse. The tunnel was filled up with 3,000 m3of glacial materials. Geological investigations realized after the accident showed that a narrow glacial valley was present at this location the water table was 40 m above the tunnel level. The paper will describe the collapse and the remedial methods which were implemented to proceed through the failure area. These included drainage works,2,000 m3 grouting and 6,200 ml jet grouting columns.

Jan 1, 1999

By Ernst P. Hall

The Irwin Basin. (Fig. 1)* is a synclinal or shoe-horn *Figure numbers throughout refer to color slides not included with the preprint shaped basin in the Pittsburgh Coal Seam, It is approximately 10 miles wide and 22 miles long at its maximum points. The surface of the land above the basin is hilly, rolling farmland,, typical of this area of Pennsylvania, and it is criss-crossed with streams and highways and liberally dotted with farm houses and communities. In-general the coal is pitched from north to south with a total drop of 610 feet'. The coal seam cross-section from east to west is bowl-shaped and rises as much as 375 feet from the low point of the bowl to-the-outcrop. Cross-sections showing coal elevations are shown on Figs, 4 and 50 Ground cover above the coal will vary from 0 to 550 feet, averaging about 350 feet throughout the area. This area is richly endowed with a history of coal mining. The first car of coal shipped cast of the Allegheny Mountains was mined in the Westmoreland Coal Company's Shady Grove (later North Side) Colliery in Irwin, Pa., early in 1853, This mine was opened in 1852 by Coleman, Hillman & Company. The coal was hauled from the mine to the freight station by horse-drawn wagon and. loaded into a then "standard" box car of 18,000-pound capacity. Coal mining in this region flourished and grew as steel production in nearby Pittsburgh demanded more and more of the high quality, metallurgical-grade coal of the region.

Jan 1, 1959

By Jorge Olivari Ortega

El presente texto señala la función del último gobernante del Imperio Inca, Túpac Cusi Huallpa y su relación con los tesoros escondidos de este, producto de la explotación de yacimientos auríferos

Jul 1, 2015

HW Process Technologies, Inc. (HWPT) has developed a patented membrane-based ion fractionation system, which specifically separates copper from gold and silver species in a cyanide matrix. This Engineered Membrane Separation (EMS?) system was pilot demonstrated on the 82,000 liters of pregnant leach solution' (PLS) generated from tailings, via thin layer leaching, at a mine site in Durango State, Mexico. The EMS? recovered ~90% of the gold-silver cyano-complex to a 90% volume permeate (based upon an EMS? feed stream of 100% volume) while rejecting -90% of the copper cyano-complex to a \0% (by volume) concentrate. The EMS? technology combines pore-size specific electro-statically charged membranes with engineered materials of construction and application-specific operational design that reject multi-valent, ionically charged species to the concentrate and transmit mono-valent species through the membrane to the permeate. The 850 ppm Cu PLS contained approximately 0.8 gil free NaCN with, the copper cyano-omplex principally in the CU(CN)3 and CU(CN)4 forms. The gold grade of the PLS was -2 ppm Au. The ~LS calcium concentration at -700 ppm Ca was reduced to ISO ppm.Ca (± 50 ppm) by sodium cycle ion exchange pre-treatrnent prior to EMS? processing.

Jan 1, 1998

Membrane technology has been available for over 36 years, but has been used sparingly in the general mining industry. However, recent developments in polymer chemistry, spiral wound element construction, pretreatment equipment and techniques and an expanded understanding of membrane fouling and cleaning techniques have dramatically improved the reliability and robustness of membrane based systems in the mining industry. Harrison Western has expanded the use of this “new” technology to enhance the use of membrane technologies to separate metals from large volume heap leach mining solutions containing copper, zinc, and iron, gold or silver. Moreover, membrane technologies are ideally suited to fractionations that add value to processing fluids from refineries like separating metals from acids or concentrating acids and producing high quality process fluids. Finally, wastewater from Acid Mine Drainage (AMD) or, as in the case of the Newmont Yanacocha Mine in Peru, the treatment of excess barren leach solution created during the rainy season, can be cost effectively processed to meet World Bank Standards for surface discharge. Polymeric membranes, specifically thin-film composites, have been developed that will purify, fractionate or concentrate gold, silver, copper, zinc or nickel. Recent applications have been developed for spiral wound modules that operate across the pH spectrum from 0 to 14. Systems using membranes have been constructed that operate on feed streams from 140° C to 300 centipoise. Opportunities exist to apply membrane technology to concentrate gold, silver, copper, zinc or nickel using thin film composite membranes. Engineered membrane types can operate across the spectrum from low pH (<2) acid applications to high pH > 10 cyanide applications. Incorporating HW EMS™ membrane technologies into current mining operations could allow one to increase production because the membrane technology would be used to pre-concentrate heap leach solutions, and therefore, increase utilization of existing extraction and refinery capabilities.

Jan 1, 2007

By H Kim, M J. Sun

In order to reduce carbon emissions from the steelmaking process and achieve carbon neutrality, global steel companies are establishing their own medium to long-term strategies and implementation plans using competitive technological advantages held by each steel company. At this point, Hyundai Steel has formulated a product-oriented carbon-neutral strategy based on innovative processing that makes use of Hyundai Steel’s own strength. Based on our experience in electric arc furnace product manufacturing and blast furnace operation in an integrated steel mill, Hyundai Steel is driving the Hy3 (Hy-cube) project, which involves a unique hybrid production system utilising hydrogen and hydrogen-based renewable energy sources. This initiative aims to achieve carbon-neutral production and eventually specialise in producing premium carbon-neutral automotive parts. The project has originality in that it involves not only designing processes using electric furnaces to produce premium steel products such as car body panels and electrical steel sheets, but also aims to reduce carbon emissions from the process, developing carbon-neutral products based on market demand. To assess the feasibility of the Hy3 project, Hyundai Steel conducted two pilot productions. The first pilot was producing a prototype of lower-arm part using electric arc furnace with three different kinds of raw materials: molten iron, HBI (hot briquetted iron), and scrap. Successful performance evaluation of auto parts with 1 GPa strength was achieved. The second pilot has been focused on tire cord steel, with the first-phase tests yielding a 33 per cent reduction in carbon footprint (CFP). Using the advantages of operating experience in electric arc furnace, Hyundai Steel is preparing for test operations producing various automotive parts using an electric arc furnace (EAF) to advance the Hy3 concept. From a medium to long-term technological development perspective, Hyundai Steel’s blueprint includes producing high-end carbon-neutral steel products using hydrogen-reduced iron as raw material.

Jun 19, 2024