GEOVIA PCBC is used by mining companies involved in block caving who depend on it to improve profits through better mine plans, schedules and production management. With PCBC, users can design and sequence accurate and detailed undercut ring and draw bell development schedules. In today’s post we’ll explore the new undercut modelling tool and what you can do with it.

Create realistic undercut sequences in PCBC with operational constraints

For a block cave mine, the accurate planning of draw bell development is critical in order to reach the production target of the mine. For most large block cave mines, production is limited by the number of active draw bells.

Draw bell development is linked to the development of the undercut level above, therefore it is important to design and sequence the draw bells together with the undercut rings. Once a block cave is mature and has reached a steady state production rate then a regular and consistent draw bell opening rate is required to maintain the production tonnes.

The new undercut tool can sequence the undercut and will produce a draw bell sequence at the same time. Changes to the undercut design can be easily made and the resultant impact on the draw bell sequence is reported.

Design the undercut level with exact ring shapes and precise grades

The entire undercut level can now be designed in PCBC including all of the undercut tunnels and undercut rings. Different undercut ring designs such as the crinkle cut or box cut can be applied to the ring shapes. The new undercut tool can also incorporate slot rings and slot tunnels into the design.

The tonnes and grade of each ring is calculated directly from the block model and reported in Excel. Undercut rings can be displayed as 2D projects, polygons, or 3D solids showing different grade values. Plus, ring properties can be easily edited in Excel or graphically.

Apply operational constraints to the undercut sequence

Different sets of constraints can be applied to the undercut schedule to get the desired sequence. Constraints can be applied to the minimum, maximum, and average tunnel advance rate. Additionally the total area opened within a sector can be controlled and changed per period. The lead/lag distance between undercut tunnels is easily modified to analyze the impact of the undercut lead/lag on the draw bell development.

Sequence draw bells with the undercut sequence

With the new undercut tool, every time a new undercut scenario is created the draw bells will automatically get sequenced. Draw bells can be sequenced using pre-undercut or advance-undercut strategies. An opening radius is applied such that the draw bells are sequenced once the undercut rings have been blasted and mucked out.

If the draw bell construction happens to be the bottle neck for production then the undercut sequence can be modified to match the draw bell sequence or vice versa. The draw bell sequence can also apply a smoothing factor to open draw bells in regular intervals. There are also graphical playback tools to display the undercut and draw bell sequence over time.

We hope you enjoyed learning about what’s new in PCBC. If you’d like more information on any of the above features, please contact us at GEOVIA.Info@3ds.com and we’d be happy to help!

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Truong Bui

GEOVIA Caving Business Unit Consultant at Dassault Systèmes

Truong joined the GEOVIA brand at Dassault Systèmes in 2010 and has been focused on solution implementations at client sites and software training. Truong joined the GEOVIA Caving Business Unit in 2012, where he has worked on many different block caving projects, from order of magnitude to feasibility studies, as well as being involved in sub-level caving projects.

Latest posts by Truong Bui (see all)

• Using Offset Display in GEOVIA PCBC - January 18, 2018
• Exploring the PCBC Undercut Modeling Tool - August 31, 2017