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Abstract
For many years low-density explosives have been used in the mining industry as a way of reducing overall blasting
costs whilst not adversely affecting blast outcomes. The limitations of these products have been around water
resistance, inability to vary explosive bulk density easily in a blasthole and failure to compete with ANFO on a cost
basis. The development of Flexigel, a two component emulsion based variable density explosives (VDE) has solved
the above mentioned problems and through its chemistry/formulation and blasting mechanism, it has been able to offer
solutions to traditional mining problems of post blast fume, fines reduction, wall control, ore dilution and in some
instances a reduction in blasting costs whilst still operationally being easily adapted to differing ground conditions (hot
and reactive, soft and hard and wet ground).
VDE products (manufactured at 0.50 g/cm3, 0.60 g/cm3, 0.80 g/cm3, 1.00 g/cm3 and 1.10 g/cm3) can be delivered in
a variety of conditions. The higher density products (1.00 g/cm3) are water resistant and can be pumped into wet holes
that would normally use chemically sensitized explosives. VDE at 0.80 g/cm3 and above can be used in dewatered
blastholes that would generally use a 1.3 g/cm3 density product, without comprising explosive performance. VDE at
0.6 g/cm3 have been used to replace ANFO. Operationally the product density can be changed up to three times in a
blasthole, this can be achieved whilst still loading the blasthole in a single pass.
In Australia there has been a rapid take-up of this VDE mainly to reduce blasting costs but also to address
environmental problems in the coal industry. For example reducing post blast fume, controlling air-blast in cast blasting
and controlling ground vibration. This VDE allows the blast designer to reduce powder factors whilst maintaining blast
results and lowering blasting cost.
An additional benefit is the reduced security requirements on the raw materials used. In light of the changing
international laws governing the storage of ammonium nitrate, this is becoming critical to the mining industry.
With manufacture of VDE comes the requirement of After the excellent results, further VDE Coal
efficiently transporting, handling and storing the bulking Formulation (0.6 g/cm3 density) blasts have taken place
agent. In the case of this VDE the transfer of EPS is of in the same area with productivity peaking at 2400
critical importance both from an economical and bcm/hr. These results demonstrated to the customer
environmental perspective. Completely containing the that this VDE offers a solution in higher productivity at a
EPS in all stages of handling up to product manufacture lower cost.
Technical solution:
By working together with the mine it was defined
the objective and it was to generate less fines by
each blasting. But the very first thing was to identify
the uncontrollable and controllable variables that
affect the generation of fines. The uncontrollable
ones are those which we can not interact with such as
the hardness, alteration and lithology of the ore, and
the controllable ones are; the drill pattern Burden x
Spacing, bench height, drilling diameter, powder
factor and low energy explosive.
In the controllable variables there were implemented
and assessed all changes. There were reductions in
the bench height, the drilling diameter, change of
pattern BxE, the powder factor, and the last variable,
the low energy explosive called Flexigel with a density
Figure 2: Excessive shock energy in the front row. of 0.6 g/cm 3 and 0.9 g/cm 3 for dried and wet zones,
respectively.
Normally the initiation hole results in peak overpressure
due to the high acceleration of the face movement, and in Results:
most cases it persists in the second row as a consequence With all the changes carried out to the drilling and
of the timing used between both. blasting designs, the results indicated an improvement of
A three free face blast was loaded in a 270 mm. hole fines in the feeding of the leach pile, from 14% -100# to
diameter, 60 m. deep hole, with a VDE Control Formulation 12% - 100#. This meant for the mine a significant additional
(0.6 g/cm3 density) in the first front row instead of using air revenue of 2% .
decks and other buffer techniques.
During this process it was possible to measure and
This VDE product provided the opportunity to load a full
ratify the significance of using the correct quantity of
explosive column, minimizing the previous fragmentation
explosive in the solid rock, the velocity of
and airblast problems through the improved application of
propagation of the rock versus velocity of detonation
energy in the blasthole. Fig 3. shows the reduction of face
of the explosive ratio (V p /VOD), for example for a
acceleration and subsequently face velocity, giving uniform
movement in the blast. solid rock with V p = 2500 m/s, it was obtained a VOD
of approximately 2500 m/s, compared with a high
VOD of the Anfo and emulsion of 4500 m/s,
approximately. The most relevant data were obtained
when all parameters of the controlled variables were
changed. The mine decided to go back to Anfo from
Flexigel. During the monitoring of the fragmentation in
the zone from the muckpiles of lixiviation it was
immediately detected a change from 10% -100# to
14% - 100# (20 of October, 2005). This was a clear
indication that the quantity of energy provided to the
solid rock plays a significant role in the generation of
fines. The final result was a better annual profit for the
Figure 3: VDE Control Formulation in the first front row. mine.