The analysis of shaft sinking progress as a function of technical and organizational parameters

In underground mines, where the deposit is located at considerable depths, mining shafts are key excavations. The project of making the deposit available requires selection of appropriate shaft sinking technology adapted to geological and hydrological conditions and natural hazards. Shafts can be made using the classic drilling and blasting technique or mechanical cutting of the shaft face. Mechanical cutting requires the use of a mining machine, which together with machines for loading and hauling the output and protecting the side walls is a shaft complex. Drilling using mechanized shaft complexes allows for high efficiency and work safety. To improve the efficiency of drilling, it is particularly important to implement many processes in parallel. The article presents an analysis of the progress of shaft sinking with a mechanized complex as a function of technical and organizational parameters. The analysis concerned a new generation cutting shaft complex, developed for the needs of shaft sinking for one of the Polish hard coal mines. The calculations were carried out for a shaft with a maximum diameter of 9.5 m and a total depth of 830 m. The article briefly presents a new solution for the shaft complex. There are presented results of calculations of daily drilling progress and total time of shaft sinking for the developed working technology of this complex. The efficiency of the complex depends on many factors related to technical parameters of individual machines and devices forming the complex and organizational parameters, hence a multi-variant analysis was carried out.