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COMPANY PROFILES

POLYMETAL INTERNATIONAL
Polymetal unveils Semchas PGM
potential: (2014-05-27)
Russian precious-metals company
Polymetal International plc has made
significant progress at the Semcha platinum-group metals
(PGM) property in the past year as it moves the project
towards a preliminary economic assessment

THE REPUBLIC OF GUINEA

International Call for Expressions of
Publishing Date 30 Jul 2014 10:39am GMT Author Ailbhe Goodbody Interest relating to 3 bauxite blocks located REGIONAL NEWS
in the prefectures of Boffa, Bok and
Tliml: (2014-02-18)
Americas
Drilling & Blasting The Republic of Guinea intends to launch, pursuant to the
mining Code, a competitive and transparent invitation to EMEA
tender for three bauxite mining blocks located in the
Australia/Asia
Narrow-vein mining differs from larger-scale mining in a number of prefectures of Boffa, Bok and Tliml.
ways. It is labour-intensive but low-productivity mining, which uses North America
narrow drifts that are challenging for mechanisation. Latin America
INDOCHINE MINING
Caribbean
In contrast to larger orebodies, which allow larger drifts and larger Indochine develops high-grade gold
project to deliver low-cost growth: (2013- Europe
access areas to the mining face, narrow-vein mining requires highly
12-23) Central and Northern Asia
selective extraction methods typically shrinkage stoping, cut-and-fill
and sublevel stoping mining methods, or variants. Indochine Mining Limited is developing a Middle-East Asia
high-grade gold project at Mt Kare in PNG by rapidly
developing wide, high-grade gold zones South-East Asia
Mining OEMs have been developing increasingly large machines to
North Africa
mine bulk orebodies efficiently. However, narrow-vein mining requires
higher equipment flexibility. Witold Hnat, sales director at Mine SARAMA RESOURCES Central and East Africa
Master, says: Narrow-vein mining has always generated one basic Sarama Resources scores 1.5Moz maiden Southern Africa
question: is it better to use selective mining with dedicated narrow gold resource at South Hound: (2013-12- West Africa
machines but with limited productivity per tonne, or to make the 19)
Australasia
headings wider and cut the vein with extra waste rock but with higher Sarama Resources is a West Africa-
productivity? focused gold explorer with substantial landholdings in Burkina
Faso, Liberia and Mali.
Some mines prefer to increase the size of the production heading
KEY SUBJECTS AND
and accept a higher waste-rock index in the name of higher REGULAR FEATURES
MIDWAY GOLD
productivity. Wider headings allow the use of standard drilling rigs, bigger LHDs and Midway Gold on track for 2014 production:
standard long-hole drilling equipment. However, higher waste content must be handled (2013-11-12) Exploration
later in the production process, including hauling, milling and flotation. Midway Gold is an emerging, near-term Drilling and Blasting
gold producer on track to bring its first Loading and Hauling
Other mines consider it wasteful to excavate a wide channel of waste rock, if the valuable million-ounce project, the Pan mine, to production in 2014
Crushing and Conveying
reef band is only a few centimetres thick. In order for miners to fit into the stope in a
classic drill-and-blast environment, the channel needs to be 1.2-1.5m high. The benefit of Processing
such a method with an advance of 1.5-2m per blast is that the crew can flexibly react to Browse all Company Profiles
any reef irregularities such as fault lines or undulations.

Some suppliers have developed low-profile machines for the purpose of narrow-vein
mining. However, they are often then very long in order to fit in all components, and with
reef inconsistencies, the flexibility of a machine needs to be able to accommodate such SEARCH OUR COMPANY DATABASE
variations.
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Challenges
Recently Created or Updated Company News Portals
Selective mining follows the vein with cuts as tight as possible to minimise waste-rock
content. These mining techniques are only used where required a miner would not use Wallis Drilling: (2014-09-15)
narrow-vein techniques in a traditional underground mine. Ideally, the best possible Diamcor Mining: (2014-09-15)
solution will minimise dilution and still have high productivity. Eriez: (2014-09-15)
Mega Precious Metals: (2014-09-15)
There are a number of challenges involved in these methods, with mobility and flexibility
being two of the biggest. Narrow-vein mines have to consider back heights and ventilation Northern Sun Mining: (2014-09-15)
as they are working in a compressed envelope; due to the tight constraints and narrow
passageways, miners need safe, portable and compact equipment.
Click here log into your Company News Portal
Lars Bergqvist, global product portfolio manager at Atlas Copco, says: In narrow veins,
the trend tends to be to have the smallest possible equipment, but there are ways around
this, such as selective mining. The design of drifts in the mine will set the standard for the

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24/9/2014 Mining Magazine - Narrowing down
full system throughout the life of the mine. RECENT IN-DEPTH FEATURES

Other challenges include a low production rate due to low levels of mechanisation, health
Search reports
and safety risks related to intensive manual handling and high operating costs due to the
labour-intensive nature.
Recently published Reports:
Roby Stancel, partner for innovation and Europe at Virtual Consulting International (VCI), No results werehere
found
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adds: At greater depths, closure creates the risk of machines getting stuck if insufficient
address SIGN UP Connect with us:
space between the machine and the walls is excavated. Browse the full Reports database.

In addition, if the reef band is only few centimetres thick, and only a narrow channel is
removed, it is easier to miss part of the reef. Narrow veins require good information about
their location, or sensors tracking them to accommodate reef irregularities.
SPECIAL FEATURES
Automation of narrow vein mining is also potentially difficult. John Nielson, global product
manager at Boart Longyear, says: Its difficult to automate narrow-vein mining. The miner,
whether he is operating a machine or mining by hand, is following an ore vein, wherever it Editor's Comment - Complete Archive
may lead. Ken Gooding's Fifth Column - Complete Archive
Coverage from our Investor Seminars
In contrast, production mining at mines with large, well-defined orebodies allows for Coverage from our Mines and Money events
increased automation because there are more consistent, repeatable actions required.

Nevertheless, there are some advantages to selective narrow-vein mining. The key
advantage is low dilution during the mining process, which allows for an improved head
grade. Fewer tonnes entering the processing plants mean that smaller mills can be used,
and the flotation waste volume will be lower as well. In addition, by targeting areas of high-
grade ore, narrow-vein mining allows for lower operating costs.

As mines become deeper, stresses increase, but narrow-vein mining requires less ground
control due to a smaller active mining area. Mining the ore and nothing else also has
minimal environmental impact, with a lower volume of waste to be disposed of.

Trends

High ore grades are harder to come by than they were in the past, so there is a general
trend towards deeper mining. As mines get deeper, mineral extraction costs increase due
to the longer distance ore needs to be transported, and the subsequent higher
expenditure on energy to hoist it up to the surface.

In addition, it is harder to ventilate deep mines and expensive to bring fresh air down to
the deepest areas for cooling and ventilation. Deeper mines also require a renewed focus
on smaller headings for ground-control reasons, and consequently need smaller
equipment.

Joy Global predicts that over the next decade and beyond, underground mining will
continue to migrate towards the ends of the mining method spectrum. At one end is a
move towards block caving, as some of the worlds largest open pits move underground.
On the other is the development of more highly selective methods, such as narrow-vein
mining.

Generally, it is the orebody that dictates the mining method. Damien Tang, product
manager, mining jumbos and secondary breaking units at Sandvik, says: I rather see the
narrow vein mining method as a complementary method to large-scale mining methods;
as the orebody is distributed in small veins and at high grade content, a larger-scale
extraction would not be meaningful due to too high dilution and the resulting high
extraction cost. Therefore, the use of a selective narrow-vein mining method is a good
way to extract ore economically when it is distributed in narrow veins typically less than 2-
2.5m in width. As the orebody shows more massive distribution, larger-scale mining
methods prevail.

Specialised equipment

There are a number of companies that produce drills and other equipment specifically for
narrow-vein mining.

Atlas Copco has a range of low-profile Boomer and Boltec machines for narrow room-
and-pillar mining, and small-sized Boomer, Boltec and Simba machines for narrow vertical
orebodies.

Atlas Copcos equipment has a range of features and benefits that can be discussed with
customers on a case-by-case basis and adapted to the requirements. Bergqvist
comments: There are many opportunities to gain productivity and reduce cost by looking
through the full mine design and doing trade-off studies to find the best and most efficient
solution.

The companys equipment has been used in a variety of narrow-vein mines, including in
Mexico, Poland and South Africa.

Boart Longyears narrow-vein drill rigs were developed as solutions for niche drilling
applications. Nielson says: We see the narrow-vein market remaining close to its current
size with slow growth potential.

The company states that its StopeMate and StopeMaster rigs are ideal for the tight and
narrow spaces typically seen in underground mining operations.

The StopeMate is equipped with a pneumatic rock drill, while the StopeMaster relies on a
hydraulic rock drill for production. Each is specifically designed for underground
applications, allowing for excellent access, mobility, flexibility and productivity in tight
access locations.

Nielson states: The StopeMate and StopeMaster rigs are equipped with heavy-duty
hoses to protect the driller from hose rupture and guarding for protection from moving
parts. Removing the operators from the immediate drilling area, the rigs can be controlled
with a remote positioning system up to 25m away. The StopeMaster also comes equipped
with an emergency stop circuit to cut the power to the drill if required.

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Both the StopeMate and StopeMaster are equipped with 360 rotation for greater
flexibility. The StopeMate, with a rotating/pivoting traverse, allows for versatile
configurations and is better suited for drilling smaller holes. This configuration ensures
precision drilling in both parallel and straight applications, and accurate operator control in
drop-raise, cable-bolting, fan-drilling and parallel-drilling applications. These machines are
designed for compact drilling applications in captive stopes.

Designed for bulk mining applications, the StopeMaster is capable of drilling 35m holes
measuring 64-106mm in diameter; while the smaller, more compact StopeMate can fit into
a lift cage and drills holes 12-15m deep. The StopeMate was designed to be broken down
into components for transport in tight, captive areas. Both rigs have the capability to
disengage the final drive-wheel ends in order to facilitate towing where required.

Joy Global closed the acquisition of underground-equipment manufacturer Mining

Technologies International (MTI) in June, which added a number of underground hard-
rock mining machines to its portfolio.

Joy Global now has a complete line of equipment to support narrow-vein mining methods
and work within the tight envelopes needed to be productive in such conditions.

Joy Global suggests that the Joy VR II vein runner drill, with a machine width of 1.42m, is
a great fit for this type of mining. For haulage options, the Joy DT704 truck and various
Joy LHDs provide productivity options for narrow-vein mining.

The company says the ideal narrow-vein jumbo is one that is capable of horizontal
development, bolting and even drilling some short production holes.

Joy Global is currently working on a robust semi-automatic drilling system that will allow
for precise hole location and control. It has also recently delivered a rubber-tyred VR II
that incorporated a rail option. This enables the drill to be transported quickly in and out of
long development drives, decreasing non-productive time and lowering the overall cost of
operation.

Mine Master is working on a new narrow-vein drilling rig, which it states will offer a much
bigger variety of utilisation of the equipment.

Hnat explains: Due to limited space in production headings, the working unit has to be
ready for face drilling as well as vertical long-hole drilling with quick reset of the feeder
position.

The new machine is equipped with a heavy-duty two-axial rotary actuator, which makes
changing the position from horizontal to vertical extremely easy in an area with limited
space. An additional dump cylinder improves the fore-and-aft correction movement during
vertical drilling, and matches the direction of vertical drilling in accordance with the ore
deposit.

While the narrow dimensions of some machines may cause problems with stability during
tramming and drilling, Mine Master has solved this problem with another design idea,
which it says is proven on low-profile machines a central oscillated vertical main pivot
changes the tyre load distribution and increases stability during tramming on uneven
roads and headings.

The new machine will be launched by the end of September and tested by one of Mine
Masters Australian customers. Hnat states that more information will be presented within
the next quarter.

Sandvik offers a range of equipment suited to underground mining, including drills, LHDs,
crushers and screens. Tang says: Among the large offering of Sandvik underground
drills, the compact size of Sandvik 200-class underground drills match very well to narrow-
vein mining.

The 200-series drills feature high drilling performance, enhanced product safety and
excellent mobility, Tang says. He adds that they can be used in the development of
access ramps and production drifts for cross-sections from 4m to 26m, and long hole
drilling in sublevel stoping areas.

The Sandvik DD210 and DD211 are compact development drilling rigs with a width of
1.3m that are suitable for narrow-vein drift development. The DL210 and DL230
production drills, which have a width of 1.5m, are suitable for areas with a cross-section of
2m or larger. They can be used for production drilling, cable hole drilling and other service
holes in underground narrow-vein sublevel stoping mining methods.

The Sandvik HLX5 delivers 20kW of percussive power output, for hole diameters ranging
from 51mm to 76mm. In addition, the DL210 has a stable carrier and sturdy boom, and
with 360 feed rotation it offers precise feed positioning and accurate drilling up to a 20m
depth while allowing large fan and parallel drilling coverage.

The company is currently investing in complete solutions for narrow-vein mining, including
drilling and loading. Sandviks products are used worldwide, with a concentration of
narrow-vein mining in Latin America, particularly Peru, where Sandvik equipment has a
high utilisation rate.

Reef boring

The AngloGold Ashanti Technology Innovation Consortium (ATIC) was set up with the aim
of developing safe and reliable technologies for gold extraction, including a technique
called reef boring.

Roby Stancel at VCI has been lead consultant on ATIC since the beginning and
developed the strategy for this work. Stancel tells MM: Working closely with AngloGold
Ashanti, we developed the technology roadmap and identified the resulting projects and
key collaboration partners needed to address very particular narrow-reef mining needs. In
an open innovation platform, the multitude of topics to be considered led to the creation of
the worlds largest mining-technology consortium, with 85 partners to date.

The machines used for reef boring are adapted from raise borers, boxhole borers and

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tunnel boring machines (TBMs), all of which are optimised to produce long, straight
tunnels at high speed. What ATIC needed, however, was a machine that is flexible, small,
mobile and can be backed out and relocated to other areas easily, and can be reused to
drill parallel tunnels into the reef quickly.

For development drives, the minimum diameters of TBMs are typically bigger than the
requirements of deep narrow-vein mining; the bigger the tunnel diameters, the bigger the
seismic effects, and the less optimal the dilution. As a result, design work to reduce the
size of the machine was necessary.

ATIC redesigned the TBM to accommodate these flexibility requirements, creating a type
of machine that AngloGold Ashanti has coined the haulage boring machine (HBM).

In ATICs reef-boring method, reef borers stand in larger on-reef development drives, and
do not enter the stoping area, but drill out the reef at just the right diameter to safely mine
all the gold, only the gold, all the time. There are no people in the stope, which eliminates
exposure to the main underground risk area operators stay in the development drives.

AngloGold Ashanti currently mines at 3,800m depth, and is planning on expanding to

5,000m. The deeper the mine, the higher the load on the host rock, and the less
favourable the ratio of support pillars to mineable areas, until at some point, the pillars
become so big that mining is not possible anymore, or that the mining is no longer
commercially viable.

To address this, AngloGold Ashanti has developed a proprietary ultra high-strength

backfill (UHSBF), which has compressibility, modulus of elasticity and strength properties
comparable to the host rock. With regular backfill in the region of a few MPa in unilateral
compressive strength (UCS), this UHSBF has a UCS of 180-200MPa.

Right after boring out the reef, the hole is immediately backfilled, before forces are
equalised and rock stresses shift. No gold is left behind because of the elimination of the
need for pillars. Stancel explains: This allows for drilling right next to the backfilled hole
within a few days once the backfill has cured, with a much reduced need for support
pillars. Extensive analysis and tests have been conducted to confirm the theoretical
models, and to make the ground believe it has never been mined.

The substantial reduction of seismic loads due to the UHSBF is a major safety
improvement. The UHSBF is more costly than conventional backfill, but as very narrow
channels are being mined, the volume to be backfilled is relatively small. The delivery
system for the backfill utilises existing backfill infrastructure, with some additional
components pumped separately.

You cannot beat blasting as the lowest-cost method to break rock, says Stancel. Raise
drilling is a more expensive rock-breaking method than conventional blasting if you only
look at the process step of actually breaking the rock.

However, the complete system needs to be considered the non-continuous process

with its process-inherent disruptions, seismicity caused by blasting, the inconsistent
particle size distribution that creates big pieces that are hard to transport, the blasted fines
that result in a low mine call factor accounting for gold lost in the blasting process, etc.

Considering the end-to-end solution, reef boring has a much better gold grams-per-tonne
cost due to the higher efficiencies of the total system.

AngloGold Ashanti is on its fourth iteration of reef-drilling machine, and while the first hole
took 27 days to complete (with a focus on testing and debugging rather than speed and
performance), several dozen holes have now been drilled, and the latest hole took about
three days to complete.

Stancel comments: The rapid prototyping process we apply constantly iterates and
improves the machines, and we are confident that the next iteration currently being
delivered will allow us to reach our two days/hole target. We are working on machines for
wider and narrower reef types, with which we plan to even double that target.

AngloGold Ashanti produced its first gold from the reef-boring technology at its Tau Tona
gold mine, South Africa, in November 2013. In May, it announced that it had produced
1,600oz of gold using the technology during its prototype tests.

COMPANIES IN THIS ARTICLE

Visit the links below to read profiles, see stock information and read all news on companies
mentioned in this article.

Sandvik
Boart Longyear
Mine Master
AngloGold Ashanti
Atlas Copco
Joy Global

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