ABSTRACT
A number of analytical models and physical experiments were deployed in the past to either quantify the fragmentation or understand the dynamic process of blasting into a compressible material. With a limited number of small-scale tests primarily the final swell and compaction were investigated (Belen’kii 1969, Rustan 1970, Cullum 1974, Volchenko 1977, Kirpichenko 1982, Zhang 2004 and Johansson 2011). Measurements
1 INTRODUCTION
Blasting in Sublevel Caving (SLC) has been identified throughout the literature to have a significant impact upon material flow characteristics and therefore on the overall performance of the SLC method. Brunton (2009) gives an excellent literature review. Blasting in SLC takes place in a situation with varying confinement. Blasted material swells while the caved material compacts, and also, to a lesser extent, fills parts of the void volume of the production drift. Its dynamic behaviour is dependent upon several parameters. Given factors
in full-scale were mentioned by Kirpichenko (1982). However, no details of the measurement method were given. Newman et al. (2008) measured the final swell by physical means when blasting an ore slice against caved material in a drift at Kiruna mine.
