Mining Prospects Enhanced with ANSYS Engineering Simulation

By DE Editors

ANSYS, Inc.’s software is being used in the mining industry to develop precise-delay timing for blasting. Orica USA is studying the effects of multiple blastholes on rock fracturing and fragmentation to further its ability to provide advanced Blast-Based Services to industry. The effort is shedding light on the complex physics set in motion in the rock blasting process, and the results will be used to improve overall processes.

Like other industries, mining markets are demanding low-cost products and processes that result in optimal performance and minimal environmental impact.

A blasthole produces stress waves. Multiple blastholes cause these to collide and interact — thereby magnifying, diminishing or canceling out their effects. The physics involved are complex and dependent on the time between detonations. For example, colliding stress waves can become reinforced and reflected, producing significant damage, or stress waves can become depleted in strength due to other more powerful waves. The Orica simulation study used explicit dynamics software from ANSYS to show that blast-induced fracturing and damage lag significantly behind the initial blast’s stress wave,  with the most effective delay time occurring when crack propagation and damage are maximized before a subsequent detonation occurs, a span of tens of milliseconds, depending on the rock and blast pattern.

“Mining activities remain a time- and cost-intensive business,  so accurate planning is critical. Such pioneering work from Orica has the opportunity to advance the entire mining industry — helping engineers to understand the physics that go on in an explosion, which is not visible to the human eye,” said Dipankar Choudhury, vice president, product strategy and planning at ANSYS, Inc. “Technology from ANSYS enables engineers to go beyond physical constraints and perform simulated tests that would otherwise not be possible. This is so important to exploring and expanding operational boundaries in developing leading-edge products and processes.”

For more information, visit ANSYS,  Inc.

Sources: Press materials received from the company and additional information gleaned from the company’s website.