ABSTRACT
From a wear-point of view the test results showed that it is disadvantageous to cut rock at shallow cuts with limited penetration. By changing cutter head design, by changing operating control parameters, by increasing the machine power or by changing the operating principle an increase of the feed of the cutting tools and thus less wear can be achieved. The laboratory experiments proved helpful in understanding the cutting and wear processes at small feed ranges. The increase of the feed of a chisel into the rock can lead to a change of wear mode (a change of the rate and type of wear). This change of wear mode goes together with a change of cutting mode. Experiments on artificial rock types (mortar) showed that the unconfined compressive strength, the Brazilian tensile strength, the grain size and the volume percentage of abrasive minerals affect the rate and type of wear and the specific wear.
