Project title: Vibration Analysis
Industry partner: Mandalay Resources operates a gold and antimony mine located in Costerfield, Central Victoria. The operation is spread across two sites. Augusta is the underground site and the processing plant is named Brunswick. The mine’s final product is a concentrate containing approximately 50% antimony and 80 grams per tonne gold. The concentrate is sent to China for processing where the antimony is ultimately used as a fire retardant in plastics and other synthetic materials. Historically antimony was mainly used as an alloying element in the production of munitions. There is currently a workforce of approximately 200 people engaged at the Costerfield mine site. An exploration team is currently working to secure the future of mining at Costerfield.
Project aim:
This study proposes to investigate what are the potential short and long terms impacts of tunnelling and explosive charges on the Brunswick processing site? Potential cumulative impact will be also investigated.
The broad scope includes:
- Model explosive impact on a number of geographical sites in the direction of tunnelling
- Vibrational impact upon vehicles and humans used to remove materials from tunnelling
- The specific model could be developed to study various impacts of vibrations on human health, machinery and the environment.
Students:
- 02 mechanical/aerospace/sustainable systems engineering students or engineering management students
IMAGE: https://www.flickr.com/photos/62561162@N00/5179506044
