Comparative stability analyses of traditional and selective room-and-pillar mining techniques for sub-horizontal tungsten veins

• Published in: International journal of minerals, metallurgy and materials Vol. 18; no. 1; pp. 1 - 8
• Main Authors: Navarro Torres, Vidal Félix, Dinis da Gama, Carlos, Costa e Silva, Matilde, Neves, Paula Falcão, Xie, Qiang
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Beijing University of Science and Technology Beijing 01.02.2011; Springer Nature B.V; Mining and Geo-resources Engineering Department of IST,Technical University of Lisbon,1049-001,Portugal%Faculty of Civil Engineering,Chongqing University,Chongqing 400045,China
• Subjects: Ceramics; Characterization and Evaluation of Materials; Chemistry and Materials Science; Composites; Corrosion and Coatings; Glass; Gold; Materials Science; Metallic Materials; Mining; Natural Materials; Pillars; Productivity; Quartz; Safety factors; Stability analysis; Stoping; Surfaces and Interfaces; Thin Films; Tribology; Tungsten; Veins; Veins (geology); productivity; tungsten deposits; mines and mining; stability; stoping
• ISSN: 1674-4799; 1869-103X
• DOI: 10.1007/s12613-011-0392-2

The stability and productivity concerning a modification on the traditional room and pillar for a new selective technique at the Portuguese Panasqueira Mine have been described.The traditional room-and-pillar stoping uses 5.0-m wide rooms with 3.0 m×3.0 m pillars,while the selective room-and-pillar mining technique consists in stoping with rooms of 4.0 m wide and pillars of 4 m×4 m with a subsequent selective cutting of the quartz veins at the mid pillar of approximately 0.5 m high,to obtain a pillar section with an area of 3.0 m×3.0 m.The stability and productivity analyses indicate that the selective technique obtains smaller average pillar safety factor,more rock mass displacement,more extraction and selectivity ratios,and ore grade improvement,compared with the traditional technique.These results show that the selective technique is also more convenient.This proposed selective room-and-pillar mining technique is applicable to any sub-horizontal narrow quartz veins with wolfram,gold,etc.such as the famous La Rinconada gold mine in the Peruvian Andes.