International Journal of Mining Science and Technology 28 (2018) 407–413

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International Journal of Mining Science and Technology

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/ijmst

Prediction of rotary drilling penetration rate in iron ore oxides using rock
engineering system
Hossein Inanloo Arabi Shad ⇑, Farhang Sereshki, Mohammad Ataei, Mohammad Karamoozian
Department of Mining, Petroleum and Geophysics, Shahrood University of Technology, Shahrood 3619995161, Iran

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: Prediction of the drilling penetration rate is one of the important parameters in mining operations. This
Received 9 November 2016 parameter has a direct impact on the mine planning and cost of mining operations. Generally, effective
Received in revised form 10 June 2017 parameters on the penetration rate is divided into two classes: rock mass properties and specifications
Accepted 10 April 2018
of the machine. The chemical components of intact rock have a direct effect in determining rock mechan-
Available online 24 April 2018
ical properties. Theses parameters usually have not been investigated in any research on the rock drill-
ability. In this study, physical and mechanical properties of iron ore were studied based on the
Keywords:
amount of magnetite percent. According to the results of the tests, the effective parameters on the pen-
Penetration rate
Rotary drill
etration rate of the rotary drilling machines were divided into three classes: specifications of the machi-
Rock engineering system nes, rock mass properties and chemical component of intact rock. Then, the rock drillability was studied
Chemical components using rock engineering systems. The results showed that feed, rotation, rock mass index and iron oxide
percent have important effect on penetration rate. Then a quadratic equation with 0.896 determination
coefficient has been obtained. Also, the results showed that chemical components can be described as
new parameters in rotary drill penetration rate.
Ó 2018 Published by Elsevier B.V. on behalf of China University of Mining & Technology. This is an open
access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).

1. Introduction Rock drillability studies, mostly based on empirical methods

The ability to predict the performance and efficiency of drilling
machines is very important in mining operations. The rock drilla-
bility is one of the most important parameters for mine planning,
development and economics of mine operations. Also knowledge
of drillability of rocks in engineering projects has key role to deter-
mine drilling costs. Drillability is a term used in construction to
describe the influence of a number of parameters on the drilling
rate and the tool wear of the drilling too. In this evaluation, the
drillability term was defined as a penetration rate. The rough esti-
mations of the rock drillability may cause a great risk in terms of
mining operations, selection of mining machineries and equipment
and final price of the product. Also the total drilling cost can be
estimated by the drilling rate equations. These equations can be
used to select the type of machine. Rock drillability depends on
many parameters such as rock properties and specifications of dril-
ling equipment. Although drilling equipment parameters are con-
trollable, rock characteristics and geological conditions are
uncontrollable and cannot be changed [1–4].
⇑ Corresponding author.
E-mail address: h.inanloo@shahroodut.ac.ir (H. Inanloo Arabi Shad).
and different parameters such as uniaxial compressive strength
(UCS), tensile strength, quartz content, apparent porosity, p-wave
rate and porosity, can be used also to predict the drillability. Also,
a wide range of empirical tests, such as Schmidt rebound hardness,
point load strength, shore scleroscope hardness, Taber abrasion,
cone indenter number, drilling rate index (DRI), coefficient of rock
strength (CRS), rock brittleness, impact strength index (ISI),
Cerchar abrasivity index (CAI), specific energy (SE), and texture
coefficient (TC), have been used to predict the drilling performance
[4–17].
Some of effective parameters on rock drillability are investi-
gated in the models as well as some of them have been modified.
These models may be inferred from either one or more than one
production sites, or from small experimental in laboratory. The
models may not work in all situations and cannot be able to recog-
nize and consider effective parameters on rock drillability. Rock
engineering systems (RES) paradigm is a powerful approach to
tackle this problem. This approach has been widely applied to var-
ious engineering problems such as slope stability of open pit
mines, underground excavations, rock blasting and environmental
studies such as regarding the disposal of spent fuel, river catch-
ment pollution, forest ecosystems, radioactive waste management,
traffic-induced air pollution risk of reservoir pollution [18–33].

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijmst.2018.04.004
2095-2686/Ó 2018 Published by Elsevier B.V. on behalf of China University of Mining & Technology.
This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).
408 H. Inanloo Arabi Shad et al. / International Journal of Mining Science and Technology 28 (2018) 407–413
The purpose of this research is to consider effective parameters on
rock drillability in the iron ore mines using RES approach, so as to
propose a model to predict rock drillability and classify rock drill-
ability iron ore mines based on the rock engineering systems (RES)
results.
2. Rock engineering system (RES)
The RES approach was first introduced by Hudson for solving
the complex engineering problems. This approach can be used
for the analysis of coupled mechanisms in rock engineering prob-
lems [18]. In fact, the RES approach is the basic analytical tool
and a presentational technique for characterizing the important
parameters and the interaction mechanisms in a rock engineering
system. The interactions between parameters in the RES approach
are described using an interaction matrix. An interaction matrix, so
it is the key element in the RES. The generation of the interaction
matrix can help in evaluating the weighting of the parameters
within the rock mass system as a whole.
In the interaction matrix for a given rock engineering system, all
parameters influencing the system (for example, a rock drillability
system) are arranged along the leading diagonal of the matrix,
called the diagonal terms. Otherwise, the influence of each individ-
ual parameter on any other parameter (interaction) is included at
the corresponding off-diagonal position of the matrix. The off-
diagonal terms are assigned numerical values which describe the
influence degree of one parameter on the other parameters.
Assigning these values is usually referred to as ‘‘coding the matrix”.
Several methods have been developed for this purpose, such as the
0–1 binary, expert semi-quantitative (ESQ) method and the contin-
uous quantitative coding (CQC) method [18,32–34]. The most com-
mon coding method is the ESQ which has been used in nearly all
previous mentioned works. In this method, one unique code is
assigned to each interaction, thereby expressing the influence of
a parameter on another in the matrix. Typically, coding values vary
between 0 and 4 with 0 indicating no interaction and 4 indicating
the hyper level of interaction ‘‘critical interaction”. The general
concept of the influences in a system is described by the interac-
tion matrix, which is shown in Fig. 1. Here, the influence of ‘‘A”
on ‘‘B” is not the same as the influence of B on A, which means
the matrix is asymmetric (Fig. 1a). Thus, it is important to put
Fig. 1. Interaction matrix.
the parameter interactions in clockwise direction in the matrix.
Also, a general view of the coding of interaction matrix is shown
in Fig. 1b. The row passing through Pi represents the influence of
Pi on all the other parameters in the system, while the column
through Pi shows the effects of other parameters, or the remaining
of the system, on Pi. In principal, there is no limit to the number of
parameters that may be included in an interaction matrix.
After coding the interaction matrix by inserting the appropriate
values for each off-diagonal cell of the matrix, the influence of each
parameter on the system is named ‘‘cause” (Ci) and the effect of the
system on each parameter is named ‘‘effect” (Ei). For each param-
eter, the cause obtains from the sum of its row values, whereas the
effect the sum of its column values is called (Ei) value (Fig. 1b). The
cause-effect diagram is formed by (Ci, Ei) coordinate values plotted
in cause and effect space. The diagonal line with equation C = E(C =
E line) represents the locus of points in which all the parameters
have equal dominance/subordination; the dominant parameters,
C > E, plot to the right of the C = E line while the subordinate
parameters, C < E, plot to the left of the C = E line. With such a plot,
it is therefore possible to recognize which parameter plays an
important role in influencing the system. The level of interactivity
of parameters can be used to identify parameters to be kept under
control, as their variation is likely to induce significant changes in
the system. The interactive intensity value of each parameter is
denoted as the sum of the C and E values (C + E), and it is used as
an indicator of the parameter significance in the system. The per-
centage value of C + E is used as the parameter weighting factor
[18,19,21,35].
3. Research method
3.1. Geology and mineralogy of Chadormalu Iron Ore Mine
Chadormalu Iron Ore Mine is located 165 km west of Yazd city
in the center of Iran. From geological and tectonics point of view,
this mine is one of the most complicated areas of Iran. The Chador-
malu iron oxide-apatite system (Bafq District, Central Iran) con-
tains the largest known iron ore deposit in Iran (pre-mining
reserve of 400 million tons with average grade of iron 55%), and
comprises the magmatic northern and the southern orebodies of
predominantly massive ore, and a sodic-calcic alteration envelope.
 H. Inanloo Arabi Shad et al. / International Journal of Mining Science and Technology 28 (2018) 407–413 409

More than 90% of Chadormalu deposit is located in the northern

orebody. The ore minerals consist predominantly of magnetite
and hematite. Subordinate amounts of apatite, pyrite, quartz and
feldspar may also be observed. Country rocks of the orebodies
are Precambrian metamorphic rocks, and Cambrian subvolcanic
intrusive ‘‘syenite”, gabbro-diorite, volcanic rocks (predominantly
rhyolite) with intercalations of siliceous dolomite, and pyroclastic
breccias. Due to contact metamorphism by the resurgent Sorkh
Fig. 3. Relation between UCS and magnetite percentage.
granite (Chadormalu granite), portions of the country rocks have
been converted to hornfels [36].

3.2. Effective parameters on drillability of rock

In this paper the rock drillability of rotary drilling machines that

are widely used in the iron ore open pit mines is studied. These
machines due to large diameter is very important in the increasing
the mines production. The effective parameters on the rock drilla-
Fig. 4. Relation between Poisson’s ratio and magnetite percentage.
bility are variable in different domains of mines. These parameters
can be classified into two classes: rock properties and specifica-
tions of drilling equipment. Unfortunately, the chemical compo-
nents of intact rocks that has a direct effect on the
geomechanical, seismic and breakage properties have not been
suitably studied.
For this propose, the cores of iron ore were collected with differ-
ent percentages of magnetite and hematite. The collected samples
were without gangue. Then, the geomechanical and seismic tests
based on the percentage of magnetite were conducted on samples
in the rock mechanic laboratory. These tests included uniaxial Fig. 5. Relation between elastic modulus and magnetite percentage.
compressive strength, tensile strength, elastic modulus (E), Pois-
son’s ratio (m), porosity, water absorption, P wave velocity and S
wave velocity.
Figs. 2–9 show the relations between the percentage of mag-
netite and the different parameters using regression analysis.
Table 1 presents the determination factor and root mean square
error for equations between the percentage of magnetite and
geomechanical parameters. The results show that the percentage
of magnetite has an influence on the seismic and geomechanical
parameters. Among of these parameters, the uniaxial compressive Fig. 6. Relation between water absorption and magnetite percentage.
strength, porosity and P and S wave velocities have a liner relation
with the percentage of magnetite. In additional, the uniaxial com-
pressive strength (UCS), tensile strength (T), P wave velocity (VP)
and S wave velocity (VS) have a direct relationship with the per-
centage of magnetite and Poisson’s ratio and porosity have an
inverse relationship with the percentage of magnetite.
Morales et al. determined the LPO (Lattice preferred
orientations)-derived seismic properties of iron ores in samples
with contrasting mineralogy (hematite, magnetite and quartz)
and deformed under different conditions [37]. They demonstrated Fig. 7. Relation between porosity and magnetite percentage.
that the magnitudes of the P wave velocity of magnetite are higher
than hematite (Tables 2 and 3). These results support the obtained
results in Chadormalu Iron Ore Mine concerning the relation
between magnetite percentage and P wave velocity. Morales
et al. also found that the tested samples are seismically quasi-
isotropic or weakly anisotropic, which reflect (1) an absent or weak
crystallographic preferred orientation (CPO) in some samples, (2)

Fig. 8. Relation between S wave velocity and magnetite percentage.

the high modal content of magnetite (the anisotropy of cubic min-

erals (magnetite) is usually lower than that of non-cubic minerals),
and (3) the relatively weak anisotropy of elastic stiffness of hema-
tite single crystals [37]. Such variables induce a low anisotropic
Fig. 2. Relation between tensile strength and magnetite percentage. seismic behavior even in high strained iron ores with strong
410 H. Inanloo Arabi Shad et al. / International Journal of Mining Science and Technology 28 (2018) 407–413

Table 2
P wave velocities and anisotropies of compressional (Vp) in hematite, magnetite and
quartz single crystals [37].

Seismic waves magnitude Hematite Magnetite Quartz

Vp max. (km/s) 6.86 7.47 7.03
Vp min. (km/s) 6.14 7.16 5.32
A Vp (%) 11.1 4.2 27.2
Density (g/cm3) 5.255 5.26 2.65
Fig. 9. Relation between P wave velocity and magnetite percentage.

(Iran) and Chadormalu Iron Ore Mine Company, who specializes

preferred orientation of hematite. They also stated that a plane of
seismic transversal isotropy parallel to the foliation of the aggre-
gates is developed in hematite ± magnetite aggregates and in ita-
birites with strong CPO of hematite. In these high strained
aggregates, some relationships between the crystallographic axes
of hematite and the propagation velocities can be observed. The
magnitudes of P and S-wave velocities derived of hematite CPO
are lower than the values experimentally determined in iron ores.
Furthermore, the magnetite cubic crystals increase density and
reduce porosity and water absorption in the ore mineral (Figs. 6
and 7).
With respect to obtained results from geomechanical tests, the
effective parameters on rock drillability can be classified into three
classes: rock mass properties, specifications of drilling equipment
and chemical components. In this research, feed and rotation of
rotary drilling machine with 251 mm diameter were collected as
specifications of drilling machine.
Also, rock mass index (RMi) parameter was considered as rock
mass properties due to detonate uniaxial compressive strength of
the rock mass. Palmstrom has proposed a RMi to characterize rock
mass strength as a construction material [38]. The presence of var-
ious defects (discontinuities) in a rock mass that tend to reduce the
inherent strength of the rock mass index (RMi) is expressed as
RMi ¼ qc  J p
where qc is the uniaxial compressive strength of the intact rock
material, MPa; and Jp the jointing parameter composed of mainly
four jointing characteristics, namely block volume or density of
joints, joint roughness, joint alteration and joint size. It is a reduc-
tion coefficient representing the effect of the joints in a rock mass.
The value of Jp varies from almost 0 for crushed rock masses to 1 for
intact rocks = sn Hoek and Brown’s criterion.
Silica, phosphorus and iron oxide of percentages are considered
as new class and effective parameter in penetration rate of iron ore.
In Table 4, the effective parameters on rotary drilling machine in
the Chadormalu iron ore mine are presented.
in the field of rock drillability. The experts summarized their judg-
ments of the weights of all contributing parameters and developed
the interaction matrix. When the interaction matrix is coded, the
influence of each parameter on the system and the influence of
the system on each parameter, can be computed as the sum of
codes in the parameter’s row and column within the interaction
matrix. The interaction matrix for the parameters affecting rock
drillability and the PPR of the rotary drilling is established as pre-
sented in Table 5. As mentioned, the cause-effect diagram is help-
ful in understanding the role of each factor within the system.
Fig. 10 shows the cause-effect plot for the considered system. It
can be seen that parameter 7 or potential of penetration rate is
totally affected by the system. On the other hand, parameters 4,
5 and 6 have maximum effects on the system. Moreover, parame-
ters 3 and 4 have the lowest interaction and parameters 1 and 2
have the maximum interaction in this system. Parameters 4, 5
and 6 which are closer to the cause axis are the most dominant.
Fig. 11 has illustrated the role of system’s interactivity by a his-
togram plotting the interactive intensity (cause + effect) vs. the
parameters. The histogram shows that little changes in parameter
numbers 1, 2, 3 and 6 have great influence in system behavior.
The interaction matrix shows importance and relative intensity
of parameters. It is necessary to study the actual values of param-
ð1Þ eters in detail. For this purpose 22 data sets involving six depen-
dent parameters and independent parameter were collected.
With respect all parameters quantitatively, since their real values
of the parameters directly were used to calculate the potential of
penetration rate. It can be seen from histogram of interactive
intensity that there is no possibility to remove any of the parame-
ters affecting the potential of penetration rate. On the other hand,
the six parameters are effective on calculation of potential of
penetration rate, it can be computed according to the following
equations [18].
 
1 E
ai ¼  CþP % ð2Þ
MP ij ðC þ EÞ

X
3.3. Interaction matrix PPR ¼ ai  Pij ð3Þ

The 6 principal parameters affecting on the rock drillability and
potential of penetration rate (PPR) are located along the leading
diagonal of the matrix and the effects of each individual parameter
on any other parameter (inter-actions) are placed on the off-
diagonal cells. In this research, the assigning values to off-
diagonal cells, coding the matrix, were carried out, using the ESQ
coding method. The values of each parameter have been consid-
ered based on the viewpoint of a group of 6 experts from the Fac-
ulty of Mining Engineering of Shahrood University of Technology
where MPij is the maximum rating for parameter I; ai the value
scaled from the C + E histogram for each parameter; and Pij the rat-
ing assigned to different classes of parameter values. To investigate
the relation between the PPR and the actual data of penetration
rate, in the next step, various regression equations and relations
are developed between these two parameters. In this study, SPSS
Version 16 software was used for statistical and regression analyses.
In this statistical approach, PPR values are independent variable
whereas the measured penetration rate (MPR) is a dependent

Table 1
Determination factor and root mean square error (RMSE) for equations between the percentage of magnetite and geomechanical parameters.

Item UCS (MPa) T (MPa) m E (GPa) Water absorption (%) Porosity (%) Vp (m/s) Vs (m/s)
R2 0.972 0.837 0.762 0.940 0.922 0.914 0.889 0.894
RMSE 5.506 1.522 0.039 2.645 0.134 0.270 112 163
 H. Inanloo Arabi Shad et al. / International Journal of Mining Science and Technology 28 (2018) 407–413 411

Table 3
P wave velocities and anisotropies of compressional (Vp) determined from the crystallographic orientation of hematite, magnetite and quartz within the iron ore specimen [37].

Sample no Vp max (km/s) Vp min. (km/s) A Vp (%) Density (kg/m3) Hematite (%) Magnetite (%) Quartz (%)
1 6.76 6.72 0.50 5257 67.15 37.85 0.00
2 6.67 6.60 1.10 5256 72.90 27.10 0.00
3 6.67 6.55 1.80 5256 85.26 14.74 0.00
4 6.72 6.49 3.40 5256 86.57 13.43 0.00
5 6.16 5.99 2.70 3952 50 0.00 50.00

Table 4
Used parameters in the investigation of penetration rate of rotary drilling machine in the iron ore mine.

Min. Max. Symbol Parameter No.

6.80 35.0000 F Feed (ton force) 1
42.00 0.0094 R Rotation (RPM) 2
15.86 30.3600 RMi Rock mass index 3
2.13 9.5400 Sio2% Silica percentage 4
0.06 0.3300 P% Phosphorus percentage 5
5.03 28.4500 Feo% Iron oxide percentage 6
0.50 1.4000 PR Penetration 7

Table 5
Interaction matrix.

RCi Effect (Ei)

8 4 0 0 0 0 4 P1 Cause (Ci)
8 4 0 0 0 0 P2 4
10 4 0 0 0 P3 3 3
9 2 1 1 P4 1 2 2
10 2 1 P5 1 2 2 2
12 2 P6 1 1 2 3 3
0 P7 0 0 0 0 0 0
18 2 2 2 5 14 14 REi

Note: P1 refers to feed; P2 rotation; P3 rock mass index; P4 silica percentage; P5 phosphorus percentage; P6 iron oxide percentage; and P7 potential of penetration rate.

variable. The maximum determination coefficient (R2 = 0.826) was

obtained in quadratic equation (Eq. (4) and Fig. 12). It should be
noted that the PPR values are divided by 100 to eliminate the per-
centage of PPR values.
 2  
PPR PPR
MPR ¼ 45:82  58:03 þ 18:93 ð4Þ
100 100
where MPR is the measured penetration rate; and PPR the potential Fig. 11. Interaction intensity for the parameters in considered system.
of penetration rate that is obtained from RES.

3.4. Comparing RES and regression predictive models

To compare the RES and regression predictive models, regres-

sion models correlate the relationship between quantitative inde-
pendent variables and dependent variables and therefore for
creating regression predictive models merely quantitative vari-
ables can be considered. For this reason, various regression equa-

Fig. 12. Relation between the measured penetration rate and PPR.

tions were developed between measured penetration rate and

Fig. 10. Cause-effect plot for the considered system.
independent variables. Accuracy of developed predictive models
were assessed by some statistical methods such as root mean
square error (RMSE) and the accuracy factor (Af). RMSE is a quad-
ratic scoring rule which gives the average magnitude of error,
weighted according to the square of the error but it does not indi-
cate the direction of the deviation. The RMSE, a measure of the
goodness of fit, best describes an average measure of the error in
412 H. Inanloo Arabi Shad et al. / International Journal of Mining Science and Technology 28 (2018) 407–413

Table 6 where ypred,I and yobs,i are the predicted and observed value of each
Comparing RES and regression predictive models. parameter respectively; and n the number of observations. The lar-
Af RMSE R2 Model ger the value of Af, the less accurate is the average estimate. A value
1.038 0.217 0.019 Linear
of one indicates that there is perfect agreement between all the pre-
1.037 0.216 0.025 Polynomial dicted and the measured values. From the statistical point of view,
1.037 0.216 0.023 Power regression predictive and RES models are compared in Table 6.
1.038 0.218 0.020 Logarithmic Table 6 shows that the RES model is capable of modeling penetra-
1.036 0.214 0.052 Exponential
tion rate more accurately than the regression methods.
0.879 0.146 0.825 RES

3.5. Rock drillability domains in Chadormalu Iron Ore Mine

From the past geotechnical studies, Chadormalu Iron Ore Mine

is divided into five geotechnical domains (Fig. 13). These domains
were carried out based on stability of overall slopes in different
parts of the mine. In fact, five geotechnical domains have been
defined based on the structural, lithological and rock mass ratings
(RMR) and the orientations of pit walls.
With respect to importance of rock drillability in mine produc-
tion, selection of drilling machines and economics of mine opera-
tions, classification of a mine based on rock drillability like
geotechnical domains is very necessary. Based on the obtained
results from the RES approach, Chadormalu Iron Ore Mine can be
divided into three rock drillability domains in the iron ore oxides.
Rock mass properties which are based on geotechnical parameters
Fig. 13. Geotechnical domains of Chadormalu Iron Ore Mine in 10 years pit.
and chemical properties are considered in this classification as
effective parameter on iron ore physical and mechanical proper-
Table 7 ties. In other hand the advantage of the classification comparing
Rock drillability domains based on the RES results. to geotechnical classification is considering the chemical compo-
PPR (Max.) PPR (Min.) Domain
nents. This advantage could be useful in rock mechanics and min-
ing studies in iron ore mines as new theory. Table 7 and Fig. 14
0.566 0.507 1
presents rock drillability domains based on the RES results.
0.666 0.566 2
0.764 0.666 3
4. Conclusions

In this research prediction of rotary drilling penetration rate in

Chadormalu Iron Ore was studied. At first geomechanical parame-
ters of iron oxides such as uniaxial compressive strength, tensile
strength, elastic modulus, Poisson’s ratio, porosity, water absorp-
tion, P wave velocity and S wave velocity were measured and com-
pared with magnetite percentage. Then, rock drillability of rotary
drilling machine were predicted using the RES approach. Finally,
Chadormalu Iron Ore Mine divided into three rock drillability
domains. The following remarks are to note:

(1) The magnetite percentage has a direct relationship with uni-

axial compressive strength, tensile strength and P and S
wave’s velocities.
Fig. 14. Rock drillability domains of Chadormalu Iron Ore Mine in 10 years pit.
(2) The magnetite percentage has an inverse relationship with
Poisson’s ratio and porosity.
(3) The results showed the feed, rotation, rock mass index and
predicting the dependent variable. Compared to the mean absolute iron oxide percent have important effect on penetration rate.
error, the RMSE gives greater weight to large errors than to small Then a quadratic equation with 0.896 determination coeffi-
errors on the average. It is therefore a more appropriate statistic cient has been obtained. Also, the results showed that chem-
to use when large errors are particularly undesirable. Its sensitivity ical components can be described as new parameters in
to large errors also means that it may not give stable estimates of rotary drill penetration rate.
error if small samples are used (Eq. (5)). Accuracy factor (Af), a sim-
ple multiplicative factor indicating the spread of results about the
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