Tag Archives: Northam Platinum

Record hole in progress at Northam Platinum’s Zondereinde: Master Drilling

Master Drilling says it is in the process of drilling a world record hole at Northam Platinum’s Zondereinde platinum group metals mine, in the Bushveld Complex of South Africa.

The contractor has its flagship RD8-1500 raisebore rig on site at Zondereinde and is busy drilling the 4.8 m, 1,420 m deep hole at the operation, it said today.

Master Drilling said: “The project doesn’t just beat all previous drilling benchmarks, but also has very stringent accuracy requirement that requires the latest in Measurement While Drilling technology.”

While Master Drilling did not add any additional details in the news post, Northam Platinum said in its full-year results presentation for the year ending June 30, 2019, that planning and preparation for raiseboring the No.3 shaft at the Western Extension project at Zondereinde was in progress. It added, in a presentation last month, that pilot drilling for the raisebore was at 760 m.

Northam is targeting steady state platinum group metal production of 50,000 oz/y from the Western Extension, which it hopes to achieve in its 2025 financial year.

Master Drilling’s RD8 rig has been used at various mine sites across South Africa and is capable of drilling 8.5 m in diameter and over 1,500 m deep, the company said.

Northam Platinum to trial Master Drilling’s Mobile Tunnel Borer

Northam Platinum is reported to have signed a deal with Master Drilling to trial the Mobile Tunnel Borer (MTB) technology the JSE-listed equipment company has been working on.

According to Mining Weekly Online, the MTB will be tested at the mining company’s Eland mine, in South Africa, as part of a “R93-million ($6.6 million) shared risk-and-reward contract” with Master Drilling.

Just last month, Master Drilling hinted such an announcement would soon be forthcoming, remarking in its 2018 financial results that the one MTB unit it had constructed was being shipped to South Africa to take part in a pilot project. It has since confirmed that the MTB will head to Eland.

Mining Weekly Online said much of the tunnel boring equipment arrived in Durban last week and is expected to become operational at the mine, near Brits, in June.

The MTB to be used by Northam was previously cutting soft rock in a quarry just outside of Rome, Italy. IM visited the quarry last year.

The unit IM saw was made up of four track-mounted units containing various parts – the cutter head and bolting section is up front, followed by the transformer and 300 m capacity water and electrical reels on the third unit, and a 14 m³ capacity storage bunker and discharge system on the fourth unit.

The full-face cutter head had 17” disc cutters, which are conventional from a tunnel boring perspective but are made up of five separate segments. This cutter head, like the majority of the 240-300 t MTB, was designed to be broken down for transport.

The equipment, which unlike other TBMs is designed to go around corners, was developed by Italy-based Seli Technologies, which Master Drilling, through a joint venture with Ghella SpA, recently acquired.

The MTB comes with 5.5 m diameter cutter head or 4.5 m diameter cutter head. The former is for declines, portals, haulages, inclines, ramps, ring roads, etc, with the latter allowing for excavation of drives and contact tunnels.

Master Drilling is aiming for an advance rate of 6-9 m/d in 200-250 MPa rock, but is not discounting the possibility of a higher rate should the additional mucking transport systems behind the 23 m (4.5 m diameter MTB) or 31 m (5.5 diameter MTB) machines be able to keep up.

At Eland, the equipment has reportedly been contracted for six months to see if it can operate effectively. The targeted advance of more than 100 m/mth in mine, which is only 200 m below surface, is roughly three times the conventional capability, Mining Weekly Online said.

There is also potential for a similar machine being deployed at the company’s Booysendal operation, according to the publication.