ES2724407T3 - Procedure for extracting natural materials, mainly from rocks - Google Patents

Abstract

Procedure for extracting natural materials outside a floor (2), characterized in that it includes the following stages: a) realization of a network of holes (6) substantially vertical in the ground (2) according to a predefined mesh, presenting the holes ( 6) a diameter greater than 1 m, b) making two substantially vertical cuts (12, 14) between two neighboring holes (6), c) making a substantially horizontal cut between two vertical cuts (12, 14) so that a block, called a bar, is separated between two neighboring holes (6) and the extraction of said bar (10), d) repetition of stages b) and c) so that a strip of polygonal shape is formed, thus delimiting a block, e) carrying out a horizontal cut under the block so that it is released from the ground and removed from said block, said block being able to be in one piece or in several pieces.

Description

DESCRIPTION

Procedure for extracting natural materials, mainly from rocks

Technical sector

The present invention relates to a method of extracting natural materials, mainly from rocks.

State of the art

The field of the present invention is thus mainly the exploitation of quarries to obtain rocks (granite, sandstone, ...) destined to be used for example in the field of construction.

In most quarries, it is also common to use explosives to separate blocks of rocks or the like from the rest of the reef. Although the manipulation of explosives is increasingly controlled, there is still some uncertainty as to the shape and size of the blocks obtained after the explosion of a powder charge.

In addition, such a procedure generates great sound discomfort and due to this the quarries are frequently separated from the inhabited areas and therefore also from the places where the extracted rocks are used. In addition to the sound discomfort, the quarries often aesthetically mark the landscape and then the corresponding area is hardly usable for the reception of buildings.

It is known, for example from document FR2600375, the use of a quarry by direct cutting of the stones or the like. This document proposes, for example, to make on the upper surface of a site and between at least two edges of it a plurality of parallel vertical cuts of identical height taken from the same horizontal plane and which define between them stone plates, then remove said stone plates so that a front of vertical size is obtained along an edge of the site, then cut along the entire length of the front and inclined stone blocks, so that, on the one hand, it allows the passage of the cutting tools and, on the other hand, form guiding reference supports to obtain a good parallelism of at least two faces of the cut stone blocks, and then to progress perpendicularly in the front as the cut progresses by placing supports of guiding reference and in repeating this operation when the front is no longer usable, that is to say when said front is no longer sufficient in its thickness p To supply usable stone blocks.

Object of the invention

The present invention aims at optimizing also the exploitation of a quarry and more generally the extraction of natural materials.

An object of the invention is to limit the losses of materials and therefore allow maximum use of the extracted material. This allows, in addition to an increase in site performance, to limit the amount of "waste" to be treated and evacuated.

Another objective of the present invention is also to limit discomfort, sound and aesthetics, during the extraction of rocks or the like. Preferably, these inconveniences are so limited that it becomes reasonable to approximate the extraction site to the place of use of the extracted materials.

Another object of the present invention is to allow the "reuse" of the land once the extraction of materials is finished.

For this purpose, the present invention proposes a method of extracting natural materials out of a soil, characterized in that it includes the following steps:

a) realization of a network of substantially vertical holes in the ground according to a predefined mesh, the holes having a diameter greater than 1 m,

b) realization of two substantially vertical cuts between two neighboring holes,

c) realization of a substantially horizontal cut between two vertical cuts so that a block, called a bar, is separated between two neighboring holes and the extraction of said bar,

d) repetition of stages b) and c) so that a strip is formed in a polygonal way thus delimiting a block, e) carrying out a horizontal cut under the block so that it is released from the ground and removal of said block, being able to be said block in one piece or in several pieces.

With such a procedure, the footprint on the ground surface is controlled because it is limited to the meshing of the holes. In addition, after the exploitation of the rock, there is a hole of limited size that is sufficient to ensure. There is no "visual" nuisance: the site is only very little affected by the exploitation of natural material. This procedure also allows excellent performance because it works only for cut. It is also possible to recover material from the holes in the hole meshing because the latter are of a fairly large diameter.

To facilitate the extraction work, the holes in the ground preferably define a rectangular mesh and also preferably square. In this way, it is possible to maintain some adjustments of the tools during numerous cutting operations and others.

In an extraction process according to the present invention, the holes made in the ground are for example circular cylindrical holes whose diameter is between 2 and 3 m, preferably between 2.2 and 2.6 m. This hole size mainly allows the material removed to be used to make these holes and thereby limit losses. It also facilitates the introduction of the tool to make the cuts of the natural material for the formation of the bars. In this configuration, it can also be provided that the axes of two neighboring holes are distant from each other a distance between 5 and 10 m, preferably 6 to 8 m.

To limit the footprint on the surface of the land and increase the yield (in m3 per m2) of the quarry, the depth of the holes made corresponds to several times the height of the bar and / or several times the height of a block and stages b) ae) are repeated so that a cavity, also called a well, is made, deeper and deeper in the ground.

In order not to weaken the surrounding terrain, especially when the footprint on the ground becomes larger, it is expected that the stages of realization and extraction of bars and blocks are repeated so that at least two (or also more) neighboring wells are made , some wells corresponding to the extraction of several adjacent bars and blocks and that two wells are at least partially separated by a substantially vertical wall. This vertical wall thus forms a natural reinforcement (it is not added but corresponds to the natural material that has not been affected by the extraction and therefore has its structure and its original links). The creation of steps between two neighboring points can be conceived to maintain reinforcements. The creation of these steps allows to extract a greater amount of natural material. It also allows a link between the two wells if the latter are reused below.

To also increase the performance of the present extraction procedure, the substantially vertical holes are advantageously made by making a peripheral cut so that at least a part of the corresponding material is recovered. Such a peripheral cut can be made with a tool as described and claimed in WO-2013/057442.

The present invention also relates to a quarry operation procedure, characterized in that it includes the implementation of an extraction procedure as described above.

Such an exploitation procedure includes defined stages for the extraction of natural material out of the ground, said stages being implemented so that a well is made and this exploitation procedure also includes a stage of conditioning said well, for example by performing a floor in said well. This floor can cover the bottom of the well - for example a layer of concrete (or other) -. It can also be the realization at an intermediate height (or at several intermediate heights) of a floor. Any material (concrete, vaults, metal posts, wood, etc.) can be used for the realization of this floor.

In a variant embodiment of this operation procedure, some stages of realization of a building with a roof that at least partially cover the network of holes made in the ground can be provided, said building being able to be made before making the holes in the ground. The realization of a building with a roof is independent of the realization of wells and / or soil (s) in a well. Such a building allows the extraction of natural material on deck and therefore greatly improve the working conditions of the workers involved in the realization of this extraction.

Description of the figures

Details and advantages of the present invention will be better appreciated from the following description, made with reference to the attached schematic drawing in which:

Figure 1A is a perspective view illustrating a first stage of the extraction process, Figure 1B is a top view of Figure 1A,

Figures 2A-6A, respectively 2B-6B, are views corresponding to Figure 1A, respectively 1B, for later stages of the extraction process and

Figure 7 is a perspective view of a quarry in the process of exploitation or at the end of its exploitation.

Detailed description of the invention

The procedure described below is given for purely illustrative purposes. The person skilled in the art will particularly understand that the order of certain stages can be modified without substantially changing the result obtained while also presenting advantages in relation to a prior art extraction procedure.

As illustrated in Figures 1A and 1B, it is proposed to make a network of holes in the ground. It is assumed in this case that a substantially horizontal floor 2 is available. Of course, in nature there are no perfectly flat soils as in the figure. It is possible, however, to make the network of holes also in a substantially flat terrain, in a plain, on a sloping terrain, on the side of a hill, on a hill or a mountain. In the figures, a parallelepipedic block that corresponds to a volume of soil from which the natural material will be extracted has been represented on each occasion.

In most cases, whether the ground is substantially horizontal or substantially sloping, the holes will be holes that extend vertically from the surface 4 of the ground. This orientation is natural and will facilitate certain operations, especially when it comes to raising important masses to remove them from the ground.

The holes 6 are preferably circular cylindrical holes. This form is the easiest to perform. The holes are preferably made with a drilling device that makes the hole by rotating a drilling tool on the ground around a rotation axis.

It is proposed in this case to make the holes in the ground with the aid of a drilling device such as that described in WO-2013/057442. The drilling procedure of the holes is then, for example, a procedure such as that described on pages 9 to 13 of this prior art document. This procedure makes it possible, step by step, large diameter holes and also of great depth by extracting cylindrical blocks of natural material. It is proposed in this case to make holes whose diameter is of the order of 2 to 3 meters (m). In Figure 1A, a core 8 obtained during the drilling of a hole 6 of the network using the drilling device of WO-2013/057442.

The holes 6 made, for example, have a diameter of the order of 2.4 to 2.5 m. Cores 8 are then obtained which have a diameter of more than 2 m and which can be perfectly used after cutting, configuration and other treatments.

The network of holes 6 is carried out, for example, on the basis of a rectangular or preferably square mesh. The passage between two neighboring holes 6 (distance for example from center to center) is for example between 5 and 10 m, preferably between 6 and 8 m. These dimensions are given by way of illustration to give an order of magnitude associated with the procedure described herein. They are not however limiting. Of course, depending on the uses made of the rock, or other natural material, extracted, the dimensions of the holes and meshing will be adapted. Due to the manipulations, it is not possible to cut too large blocks of rock that would not be transportable.

It is proposed in this case to make holes 6 of great depth, from a dozen to several tens of meters, one after the other, before continuing the extraction procedure.

A second stage is illustrated in Figure 2 (Figures 2A and 2B). it is in this case to extract the rock (it will be assumed in the following that the natural material exploited in this case is rock, for example granite, without the extraction procedure being therefore limited exclusively to this material).

In the course of this second stage, a piece of rock, called bar 10, is removed from the ground. To extract said bar 10, a first vertical cut 12 is made between two neighboring holes to a given depth, then, always between the same two holes 6, a second vertical cut 14 is made in parallel and at a distance from the first vertical cut 12. The two Vertical cuts are made to the same depth. They can be made with a cutting wire such as that described in the aforementioned document or also with a cutting system of the type described in FR2725931 or also in WO-89/08525. The cutting device can penetrate the ground at the height of the two holes 6 that are at the ends of the bar 10. In this way a part of the rock linked to the ground is defined only by a lower face. In order to separate the bar 10 from the floor 2, it is sufficient that at the end of the second vertical cut 14, the cutting system changes the cutting direction to proceed to cut horizontally and thus to join the bottom of the first vertical cut 12.

Lifting means not described here can then be used to get the bar 10 off the ground. These lifting means can be classic lifting means, which the person skilled in the art knows, usually used to lift heavy loads (rock blocks) in a quarry. For purely illustrative purposes, if the holes 6 have a diameter of 2.5 m and the distance between two neighboring holes is 7.5 m, then a bar 10 will have a length of the order of 5 m, a width of the order of 2 m a certain height depending on the use that will be made of the rock of the bar 10 and also of course of the lifting possibilities of the lifting means used. Depending on the latter, the dimensions of the meshing of the holes in the ground will already be adapted.

Figures 2A and 2B suggest successively removing bars 10 from the ground until they reach the bottom of the two neighboring holes 6. In this way, the cutting device remains in place in the two holes 6 neighbors until all The bars 10 that can be cut between these two holes are removed from the ground.

In the attached figures, a limited number of holes 6 are shown. These holes 6 are arranged, in the purely illustrative embodiment of the drawing, according to a square mesh mesh, on three lines L1, L2 and L3 and eight columns C1 to C8.

In Figure 3, it is proposed in a next step to remove the bars 10 among other holes 6. In this way, it is proposed in this case to remove bars 10 oriented along the lines L1-L3 between the columns Ci, Ci + 1 except between columns C4 and C5.

In the following stages, as illustrated in Figure 4, the bars 10 oriented according to the direction of the columns Ci are removed from the ground. The procedure in this case may be perfectly the same as for the first bar 10 as proposed above. In Figure 4, the bars 10 are removed from the ground on column C1 between lines L1 and L2.

Then, as illustrated in Figure 5, all bars 10 oriented according to columns Ci are removed. Once all the bars 10 are removed, there are twelve pillars 16 extending each vertically from a bottom 18 of a well 20. Due to the cuts of the bars 10, omitting to cut and remove the bars on the lines Li between the columns C4 and C5 , two wells have been made 20 neighbors.

By means of horizontal cuts, the pillars 16 are "sliced" to form blocks of rock. In the numerical example given above, each block has, in a view from above, a substantially square shape of approximately 5 m side. The height of the rock block is adapted in this case also depending on the intended use of the rock and the lifting possibilities of the available lifting means. As suggested in Figure 6, if a block of great height is desired (for example with a dimension greater than 5 m in the previous numerical example), then a horizontal cut is made at the desired height and, in order to be able to raise for the extraction of the rock from the ground with the available lifting means, supplementary vertical cuts are provided. Figure 6 proposes to cut a block into six "sub-blocks". For example, there are "sub blocks" that have dimensions of 6.0 x 2.5 x 1.7 m.

Figure 7 illustrates the floor 2 once the operation is finished. To optimize the amount of rock extracted or to join the two wells 20 together or for other reasons, it is proposed to remove the rock also between the two wells 20. Depending on the dimensions of the wells 20, it is preferable, as has been illustrated in figure 7, leave some reinforcements between the wells 20. The surrounding terrain has not been weakened thus by the use of the soil that has been made. The dimensions of each well will depend on the nature of the land and its stability and / or also the eventual subsequent use that will be made of the well. An originality of the proposed procedure is in fact the possibility of the proposed rehabilitation of the exploitation site. In this way the extraction is carried out not only based on the limitations linked to the extraction but also based on the forecasts of use following the site, once the rock or similar extraction is finished.

The procedure described above allows to perfectly control the footprint on the ground surface by the exploitation of the quarry. In the example illustrated in the drawing, a footprint of 55 x 17.5 m, that is less than 1,000 m2, allows, by excavating at 25 m, to extract approximately 20,000 m3 of rock. Such a quarry therefore has a very good performance.

Since the footprint is perfectly controlled on the floor surface, it is possible to cover the quarry with a roof. Indeed, it is enough to build a hangar above the hole network before or after the completion of this network of holes for dry work.

The discomfort is limited with the procedure described above. Of course, there are sound discomforts due to the operation of the motors used, the means of transport and the rock drilling and cutting devices. However, they are limited in relation to the discomforts usually found in a rock quarry. It is especially the aesthetic discomforts that are the smallest. After the exploitation of the soil and the extraction of the rock, some holes remain in the ground that do not get to denature the surrounding landscape.

In addition, the site can be rehabilitated below. A slab can be made at the bottom or at an intermediate height in a well so that one or more floor (s) are formed in the well. It is thus possible to make a semi-underground building. Wells can also be used for material storage or as a water reservoir or as a methanization tank.

The proposed procedure is as well adapted to small farms (for example limited to two wells as illustrated in the attached drawing) as well as large farms: it is sufficient to adapt the hole network, the depth of the exploitation. Some wells can be done or not, etc ...

Thanks to the limitation of inconvenience and / or the possibility of having a small quarry, the procedure - and therefore the place of exploitation - can be implemented in the vicinity of a village or a place of use of the extracted rocks.

The proposed procedure can be adapted to any type of terrain (flat, sloping, ...). It is extremely modular and can also be adapted to any configuration.

The present invention is not limited to the procedure described above and to the variants designed. It also refers to all evoked variants and variants within the scope of the person skilled in the art within the framework of the following claims.

Claims (10)

1. Procedure for extracting natural materials outside a soil (2), characterized in that it includes the following stages: a) realization of a network of holes (6) substantially vertical in the ground (2) according to a predefined mesh, the holes (6) having a diameter greater than 1 m, b) realization of two substantially vertical cuts (12, 14) between two neighboring holes (6), c) realization of a substantially horizontal cut between two vertical cuts (12, 14) so that a block, called a bar, is separated between two neighboring holes (6) and the extraction of said bar (10), d) repetition of steps b) and c) so that a strip is formed in a polygonal way thus delimiting a block, e) making a horizontal cut under the block so that it is released from the ground and removal of said block, said block being able to be in one piece or in several pieces. 2. Extraction method according to claim 1, characterized in that the holes (6) in the floor (2) define a rectangular mesh. 3. Extraction method according to one of claims 1 or 2, characterized in that the holes (6) made in the ground (2) are circular cylindrical holes whose diameter is between 2 and 3 m, preferably between 2.2 and 2.6 m. 4. Extraction method according to claim 3, characterized in that the axes of two neighboring holes (6) are distant from each other a distance between 5 and 10 m, preferably 6 to 8 m. 5. Extraction method according to one of claims 1 to 4, characterized in that the depth of the holes (6) made corresponds to several times the height of the bar (10) and / or several times the height of a block and by that stages b) ae) are repeated so that a cavity, also called a well (20), is made deeper and deeper in the ground. 6. Extraction method according to one of claims 1 to 5, characterized in that the stages of realization and extraction of bars (10) and blocks are repeated so that at least two neighboring wells (20) are made, corresponding a well (20) to the extraction of several bars (10) and neighboring blocks and the two wells (20) being separated at least partially by a substantially vertical wall. 7. Extraction process according to one of claims 1 to 6, characterized in that the substantially vertical holes (6) are made by making a peripheral cut so that at least a part of the corresponding material is recovered. 8. A quarry operation procedure, characterized in that it includes the implementation of an extraction procedure according to one of claims 1 to 7. 9. Operating method according to claim 8, characterized in that the steps defined in claim 1 are implemented so that a well (20) is made and that the operating procedure then includes an ordering stage of said well with the in order to make a floor in said well. 10. Operational method according to one of claims 8 or 9, characterized in that it includes stages of realization of a building with a roof that at least partially covers the network of holes made in the ground, said building being able to be carried out before making the holes in the ground.