Faculty of Engineering, Built Environment and Information Technology
School of Engineering
Department of Mining Engineering
Selected Highlights from Research Findings
Thermal Engineering can be described as refrigeration and the application of cooling air in underground working environments in order to optimise the amount of air supplied and the amount of air cooled. Research identified a deficiency in environmental engineering principles for hard rock mines across the sector and led to optimisation of current resources so as to ensure a healthy, safe and productive working environment. As a direct spin-off, energy conservation and optimisation can be achieved with the application of these principles.
Contact person: Dr RCW Webber-Youngman.
The aim of this project was to determine both shaft establishment and operational design parameters, together with the associated cost-models. This will be used throughout the industry as a quantitative basis for the comparison of various mine access options, both for new and existing mines. Initially, a mineral resource must be converted into a mineral reserve before one can start designing a mine shaft. The research to-date has identified the characteristics of an economically mineable reserve as a pre-requisite to the design process. The design of mine shaft is an iterative process, which requires design variables and options to be considered in order to arrive at an economic decision. The economic decision is arrived at by comparing the net present values and internal rate of return from the different options considered in the optimization process.
Contact person: Dr I I Matunhire.
Research is focussed on the further development of real-time road maintenance solutions for ultra-heavy haul trucks running under a centralised communication and asset management system. The central development here is the understanding and replication of vehicle dynamic response to the condition of the road, and how that response can be firstly isolated, and secondly analysed, to provide real-time information of the quality of the road on which the truck is running. Currently, an on-board system has been developed which gathers real-time truck dynamic data and GPS location data to enable a mine to visualise road condition directly from real-time truck operation.
Contact person: Prof RJ Thompson.
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