Talking Technically

From gunpowder to Pit Viper

Drilling and blasting
The rotary blasthole drilling rig
was a long time coming. Gunpowder was invented in China
about 1000 A.D. But in Europe at
least it took another 500 years or
more before miners started to use
it for blasting and a further three
centuries for the introduction of
mechanized drilling in surface
mines. Mobile blasthole drilling
rigs have been in use for only
some sixty years.

Gunpowder
The application of blasting agents
apparently began in Hungarian mines
sometime during the sixteenth century. To make better use of the explosive force, miners started to place the
powder in holes and it is certain that
drilling and blasting were used in several German and Scandinavian mines
early in the seventeenth century, for
instance at the Nasafjll silver mine in
Lappland in 1635, and in 1644 at the
Rros mine in Norway.
One-man drilling with the help of
a drill steel and sledgehammer was
the established technology used in the

Drilling with sledgehammer was the established

method before the development of the rock drill.

Blasthole Drilling in Open Pit Mining

The Pit Viper is designed for production drilling of large holes in hard rock conditions.

eighteenth century. This physically

demanding technique evolved only
slowly but, despite the mechanization
of other industries, remained in quite
widespread use until well into the
twentieth century. However, powered
drills did start to mount a challenge in
the 1800s, the competition in the USA
being symbolized by John Henry who
in 1870 hammered through 14 feet in
35 minutes while the steam drill only
completed nine feet.
The first patented rock drilling machine was a steam driven percussion
drill invented by J. J. Couch in Philadelphia in 1849 but it may have been
preceded by a machine manufactured
by the Scottish engineer James Nasmyth
ten years earlier. This patent spurred a
period of rapid development, accelerated in the 1860s by Nobels inventions
of the blasting cap and safe dynamite
explosives. From 1850 to 1875 some

110 rock drill patents were granted to

American inventors and seven for drill
carriers while 86 patents were issued in
Europe during this period.
In 1851 James Fowle, who had
worked with Couch, patented a rock
drill that could be powered by steam
or compressed air and could rotate the
drill steel by means of a ratchet wheel
controlled by the piston's back-andforth movement. In the 1860s large
scale rock drilling machines were built
for tunnelling by engineers in Europe
and the United States. One of the most
successful of these early rock drills
was the second refined version of the
Burleigh rock drill, which was put into
service in October 1866 at the Hoosac
tunnel in Massachusetts. The performance at this tunnel project showed that
rock drill development had taken the
step from an experimental product to a
proven and rather reliable technology.
3

Talking Technically

In 1871, a number of patents were issued to the

inventor Simon Ingersoll, who started the Ingersoll Rock Drill Company The machine produced
by Ingersoll was at this time regarded as the best
rock drill yet produced, and it was followed in
the mid 1880s by another success, the famous
Ingersoll Eclipse machine.

In 1871 the American inventor Simon

Ingersoll patented a steam powered rock
drill, later to be operated on compressed
air. Ingersoll formed the Ingersoll Rock
Drill Company in the same year, during
the following year purchased the FowleBurleigh patents and also merged with
the Burleigh company. The new compact rock drill launched by Ingersoll
was a simple and strong design with
few moving parts. The designers had
kept in view the tough conditions in
which the rock drill had to work, and
the contemporary technical opinion
regarded his new rock drill as the best
yet available on the market. During the
years to come Ingersoll bought out many
small firms and expanded his company.
The Ingersoll Rand name came into
use in 1905 through the combination of
Ingersoll-Sergeant Drill Company and
Rand Drill Company.
The AB Atlas enterprise had been
founded in February 1873 at a time
when the Swedish railway net was
being rapidly expanded. Three years
later, now with 700 employees and the
Stockholm shops completed, AB Atlas
had delivered more than 600 railway
wagons. Diminishing demand from the
railroad sector, combined with years of
losses, led to a reconstruction in 1890.
During the years to follow new product
lines were added, including compressed
4

The Ingersoll rockdrill was a simple and strong design with few moving parts.

air tools, compressors, diesel engines

and the first Atlas rock drill which was
launched in 1905.

Further development
The design of the first Atlas rock drill
featured an advanced rifle bar rotation but with a weight of 280 kg (617 lb)
it was very heavy for manual use.
Immediately and for the next 25 years
Atlas focused on light weight hand
rotated drills like the Cyclop, Rex,
and Bob. The real Atlas winner among
lightweight hand-held rock drills was
the RH-65 from the year 1932. This
machine had more efficient shank and
chuck designs for better steel guidance

and longer shank life. Used with the

new pusher leg feed system developed
in the 1930s, the RH 65 was the most
important element in what was later
to become known as the "Swedish
method" of underground drilling.
In the United States Ingersoll-Rand
expanded into pneumatic tools in 1907
by acquiring the Imperial Pneumatic
Tool Company of Athens, Pennsylvania.
In 1909 the company bought the A.S.
Cameron Steam Pump Works and entered the industrial pump business.
Ingersoll Rand also acquired the J.
George Leyner Engineering Works
Com-pany. This firm had developed a
small, pneumatic hammer that could be
operated by one man. This Jackhamer

The first drill made by Atlas "pneumatic rock drill No. 16" had a weight of 280 kg (617 lb) and was heavy
and difficult to handle - at least two men were needed to move it.

Blasthole Drilling in Open Pit Mining

Talking Technically

introduced in 1912 became a popular

item, and the company progressively
developed the design as well as supplying compressors to the expanding
construction and mining industries in
North and South America

Rock drilling tools

The parallel improvement of drill steel
quality had started during the 1890s
with development of heat treated drill
steel that could better resist deformation.
But sharpening the tips required extensive haulage of tons of drill steel between
drilling sites and the work shops. The
detachable drill bit was developed in
1918 by A L Hawkesworth, a foreman
at the Anaconda copper mine in Butte,
Montana. The first versions used a dovetail joint to the drill steel while later versions were threaded or tapered. The rods
were retained at the workings and used
with new or re-forged bits.
In Europe during the German collapse in 1918 a team was formed at
the Osram lamp factory to develop
cemented tungsten carbide as a substitute for industrial diamonds. In 1926 the
first cemented tungsten carbide became
available as a magical machine tool
for turning and milling operations. Early
tests were made in 1928 trying to use
tungsten carbide bits for rock drilling in
German mines and before World War
II promising results were obtained. By
this time the research team had scattered
and some members had been forced to
leave the country. One of these, Hans
Herman Wolff, found refuge in Sweden
where he worked at the Luma lamp factory. Dr Wolff manufactured a number
of bits according to designs provided by
Erik Ryd at Atlas. The bits were tested
in the Atlas test mine. In 1942 Atlas,
Sandvik and Fagersta signed a cooperative agreement and it was not until
1945, after a long improvement process,
that the new cemented tungsten carbide
drill bits were as economical to use as
conventional steel bits.
The post-war years saw Atlas achieve
further major advances. In 1948 the company introduced an RH 65 upgrade, the
RH 656, which was designed to use the
new cemented carbide tipped drillsteels.The superior performance of the
Light Swedish Method was exploited
Blasthole Drilling in Open Pit Mining

The US patent for a dual roller cone bit was issued to Howard Hughes Sr. in 1909.

worldwide and culminated in 1962

with the completion of the Mont Blanc
tunnel. With development of highly
mechanized drill rigs and with the
introduction in 1973 of the COP 1038
hydraulic top hammer drill Atlas Copco
laid the foundation to become a world
leader in top hammer drilling technology. (See article from wagon drill to
SmartRig, Surface drilling, Fourth
Edition 2008).

rollers equipped with steel teeth.

Drilling was accomplished by transferring a pulldown force to drive the
teeth into the hole bottom. The three
roller cones turned as the drill string
was rotated, and the teeth crushed and
spalled the rock.
While tophammer drills could be
used for small blast holes in rock, this
method was not suitable for large hole
diameters; for these rotary drills were

Rotary bits
Rotary drilling with drag bits was the
common method used in oil drilling.
These bits were suitable when drilling in
soft formations like sand or clay but not
in rock. The solution for drilling large
diameter holes in rock was by using
rotary crushing technology instead of
trying to cut hard rock with drag bits.
The roller cone bit was developed by
Hughes and Sharp, and the US patent
for a dual roller cone bit was issued to
Howard Hughes Sr. in 1909. This new
type of bit had two interlocking wheels
with steel teeth, and penetrated the rock
by crushing and chipping. The success
of the new bit led to the founding of the
Sharp-Hughes Tool Company, and after
Sharp's death in 1912 the name was
changed to Hughes Tool Company.
The company continued development of the roller cone bit and in 1933
two Hughes engineers invented the
tricone bit. This bit had three conical

The Secoroc Tricone bits are now regarded as the

ultimate blasthole bit solution.

the best alternative. However, as drillers sought to use the rotary system for
progressively harder rock formations so
the feed force (pulldown) available had
to be increased. Roller cones with long
steel teeth were used in softer formations for gouging the formation while
roller cones with shorter teeth were
used for crushing and spalling harder
formations.
5

Talking Technically

Secoroc downhole hammer (DHD), also named Down The Hole hammer (DTH)

A parallel development of the tricone bits made it possible to use these

high loads on bits. To extend the life of
the bits in hard and abrasive rock the
steel teeth were replaced by cemented
tungsten carbide inserts. Tungsten carbide inserts have significantly increased
the number of blast holes that the roller
cone bits are able to drill. Improvements
in materials have continued to increase
the life of the bearings so the cutting
structures can be fully utilized. While
the geometry of the roller cone bit is
much the same as the original bit patented in 1933, the material and technology currently utilized is cutting edge.

Downhole drilling
technology
Meanwhile, manual lightweight pneumatic drills had also underpinned the
expansion of bench mining in open cut
mines and quarries. But in the 1930s
downhole drills (DHDs ) were introduced for drilling deeper holes. The main
initial development of this technology
took place in Belgium and the United
States. Atlas designed a downhole unit
in the mid-thirties that was used with

good results in two Swedish limestone

quarries until the 1950s but the company
then ceased further DHD development,
only re-entering the market in 1969 with
the COP 4 and COP 6 down-the-hole
hammers.
In 1955 Ingersoll-Rand introduced a
new downhole drill design and started
to establish downhole drilling on a truly
commercial basis. The Tandematic,
which at the time was claimed to provide the highest drilling speed ever
attained by a downhole drill, was supplied in two standard sizes the DHD
275 for 4* inch and 5 inch holes and
the DHD 1060 for 6 and 6 inch . This
later enabled the company to build drill
rigs adapted to be used either for rotary
drilling or with downhole hammers. The
main difference is that downhole drilling requires more air, and consequently
these drill rigs had to be equipped with
a larger capacity compressor and a more
powerful diesel or electric engine.
Downhole drill technology went
through rapid change in 1960s and 70s.
In fairly rapid succession I-R developed
the DHD 325 ( their first 6" hammer),
DHD 325A, DHD 16, DHD 1060, DHD
1060 A and B models, DHD 360 (all 6"

* 1 inch = 25.4 mm, ** 1 bar = 14.5 psi, *** 1 lb = 0.45 kg

The Quarrymaster from 1948 was equipped with a huge 8" bore drifter.

drills) and corresponding larger and

smaller models, up to the current line of
DHDs. Probably the most significant
change in DHD technology was the
advent of the valveless DHD. Drill efficiency and life dramatically improved
with the elimination of the flapper valve.
Of course higher pressure and volume
air from the air compressor advancements produced the performance one
sees today. Re-entry to the downhole
drill market at 6 bar** in 1969 also enabled Atlas Copco to take advantage of
improved air compressors and develop
more and more powerful downhole
hammers, reaching 18 bar in the early
1980s and more recently 25 bar and 30
bar in the larger current hammer sizes.

Drill rigs
The mobilization of rotary and downhole drills was linked to significant
post-war changes in rotary drilling
technology. Up until then rotary drilling had been used in water well drilling
and surface mining using fluid circulation to clean cuttings from the hole.
Coal mines were using rotary drilling in
soft overburden, removing the cuttings
with augers. In the late 1940s it was realized that air was an effective flushing
medium with considerable advantages
over water, doing a better cleaning job,
protecting the bits and eliminating the
difficulties of supplying water.
Experience also proved that air flushing improved the penetration rate of
rolling cutter bits such as tricone bits
and extended their life. By using efficient air flushing to keep the bottom
of the drill hole free from cuttings the
rock breaking process became more
efficient.
In 1948, Ingersoll-Rand entered the
large-diameter blast hole market by
launching the Quarrymaster. It really
was not a rotary drill, but a large self
Blasthole Drilling in Open Pit Mining

Talking Technically

Rotary table and Kelly bar concept.

propelled mounting in the 40,000 lb

weight range, designed with on board
air and a long drill tower to drill 6 inch
to 8 inch diameter holes for mining
and quarry applications. The original
Quarrymasters were equipped with a
huge 8" bore drifter, know as the QD8.
This was a piston drill with the drill
steel attached directly to the drifter
piston. The blow frequency was in the
range of 200-300 blows per minute.
The drifter used a large rifle bar rotation system. Achieving decent wear life
between the rifle bar and rifle nut was
sometimes a problem in tight ground.
This was a single pass drill system,
hole depth was limited by the tower
length. The steel system was a heavy
wall tubular product, in the range of 4"
OD, and was extremely heavy. Since
there was no steel change, the weight
didnt seem to be much of an issue.
Quarrymasters were used in some
large iron mines in Canada and the
Atlantic City Iron Ore Mine in Wyoming.
Numerous Quarrymasters were used in
the rock excavation for the St Lawrence
Seaway in Canada.
In the same year also Atlas introduced its first mobile rubber tired drill
wagons for top hammer drilling, but
these were not equipped with any tramming machinery and were intended for
considerably smaller hole diameters.
I-R development work with downhole
drills in the early 1950s brought about
changes to the drill mounting business.
First, the Quarrymaster was equipped
with the newly developed QRD rotary
head, and this along with the new DHD
325 down hole drill, made for a productive but heavy and bulky package.
The Drillmaster design, a somewhat
smaller rotary drill, was introduced about
1955. It produced the same performBlasthole Drilling in Open Pit Mining

Big picture; Airpowered DM-3 with a DRD-2 Rotary head from the late 1950's. Inset; Tractor mounted
Drillmaster, air powered with a DRD Rotary Head from the early 1950's.

ance as the Quarrymaster in a smaller

and less costly package. Upgraded
versions of the Drillmaster, the DM-1,
DM-2 and DM-3 followed in quick
succession. Originally equipped with
sliding vane air compressors up to 900
cfm*, all were updated to the screw
compressor design. The Drillmaster
line was equipped with the DRD and
later DRD 2 rotary head to provide
drill string rotation. As with the QRD
rotary head the DRD was powered by a
vane air motor and several steps of gear
reduction. All of these drills only used
hydraulic power, from an engine driven
hydraulic pump off the cam shaft, to
operate the jacks, tower raising cylinders, break-out wrench, and dust collector drive motor. Neither rotary head was
very useful in supplying straight rotary
power for tricone bits, hence the future
development of the T-4 and DM-4
with hydraulic powered rotary head for
straight rotary drilling. I-Rs first truck
drill was called the Trucm package.
The drill frame package was mounted
on a customer provided truck, often a
used Mack truck. However, none of the
standard truck designs proved very
successful. The normal channel truck
frames were not sturdy enough, resulting in many cracked and broken truck

frames. I-Rs answer to this problem

was to join hands with Crane Carrier
Corp of Tulsa, OK, and mount the drill
components and tower directly on an
I-beam chassis frame, often used for
mounting construction cranes. This
product became the TRUCM-3 and the
same style mounting carried over to the
T-4 and T4W introduced in 1968.
A major new stimulus for blasthole
drilling rig development generally was
the introduction in the 1950s of millisecond delay blasting. This allowed
* 100 cfm = 47.2 l/s

The truck mounted T4BH was introduced in 1968.

Talking Technically

* 1 ft = 0.304 m
** 1,000 lbf = 4.44 kN = 453 kilogram-force

The DM50 could use bit loads up to 50,000 lbf

and was launched in 1970.

blasters to design multi-hole large

volume blasts that could be used for
mass production techniques in open
cut drill and blast mines. In turn this
required the introduction of large,
mobile drilling rigs able to drill large
diameter holes using tricone bits, as
well as the formulation of cheap bulk
mining explosives based on ammonium
nitrate and nitro-glycerine. These and
other developments helped the mining
industry to keep the costs of bench
drilling substantially unchanged during
the 1950s and 1960s, despite increasing
wage costs.
The Quarrymaster and TRUCM
machines were made progressively
more self-contained through the 1950s.
By the end of the decade the air supply
was up to 10 bar and the marketing
slogan Pressure is Productivity was
promoted. The drill rigs and rock drills
were sold together to maximize revenue
but this did encourage other manufacturers to build competing rock drills.

Hydraulics technology
adds to drillers options
The similarities between the air requirements of rotary and downhole drilling
8

made the design of rigs able to do both

an economically attractive proposition.
In 1965-66 Ingersoll-Rand started work
on the switch to hydraulic powered
rotation for rotary and downhole drilling,
launching first the truck-mounted T4W
for water well drilling in 1968. In the
same year this rig was modified to
make a truck-mounted blasthole rig
with a 5-rod carousel, the Drillmaster
T4BH, which could drill holes of up to
7 inch diameter and was successfully
offered for coal mine drilling throughout the 1970s. The designers also used
the power unit, tower and other components to create the crawler-mounted
Drillmaster DM4 blasthole drilling rig.
This machine was designed from the
ground up for both rotary and downhole
drilling. A 36 ft* high tower incorporated a hydraulically indexed carousel
housing seven 25 ft rods. The rotary
head featured an axial piston hydraulic motor and single-reduction worm
gear for rotation, providing 5.6 kNm
of torque and rotation speeds from 0
100 rpm. There was a choice of diesel
engine or electric motor for the spring
mounted f loating power pack and a
range of diesel or electric compressors, enabling use of either rotary or
downhole drilling with the companys
DHD-15, -16 or -17 downhole drills.
The excavator style crawler undercarriage had tracks with 22 inch triple bar
grousers driven by hydraulic motor
through a planetary gear drive and
chain reduction.
In the marketplace the DM4 competed with the more powerful electric
top drive blasthole drilling rigs. The
late 1960s and 1970s saw heavy takeup of the DM4 rig by the Appalachian
coal mines in the United States. And
the combination of patented rig, drill
and drill rod technology was very
profitable for Ingersoll-Rand. The use
of hydraulic power for rotation and
non-drilling functions meant that more
air could be made available for rotary
and, especially, for downhole drilling.
This engendered an air race in the
late 1960s and 1970s. The independent
downhole drill manufacturers were
able to build machines that could drill
at 130 ft/hour in the 6 8 inch diameter
hole range faster than a rotary drill
could achieve in this hole size range,

particularly when drilling in harder

rock types.
The development of screw compressors to supply air for drilling rigs at up
to 20.6 bar led to the 1970s introduction
of an airend to supply both low pressure and high pressure air. These units
were used in portable air compressors
and also onboard drilling rigs, where
they enabled downhole drills to outperform rotary drills in the 6 - 8 inch
hole sizes in hard rock mines. However,
rotary drills were still better for rock
compressive strengths up to medium
hard limestone.
The higher pressures were also very
beneficial for water well drilling, in
which air pressure must be sufficient
to evacuate the ground water pressure
from the hole while drilling.

Expansion of the
Drillmaster range
Significant corporate developments and
one major product launch impacted the
Ingersoll-Rand drilling business in the
mid-1970s. Firstly, in 1973 the company
acquired DAMCO (Drill And Manufacturing Company) in Dallas, Texas,
who built mechanically driven pre-split
drilling machines for quarrying and
light coal stripping. These expanded
the Drillmaster range down to the
20,000 lbf* bit weight class. The rigs
also used the rotary table drive and kelly
bar concept, which lightened the tower
structure sufficiently to accommodate
rod long enough to drill 40 50ft holes
in a single pass if required. IngersollRand added their own compressors to
create the DM20, DM25, DM25-SP
(single-pass), DM35 and DM35-SP
rotary rig models. Then, in 1975, the
company bought the Sanderson Cyclone
Drill Company in Ohio, USA, adding
12 models designed for the water well
market.
The next extension of the size class
range came with the launch of the
Drillmaster DM50 with 50,000 lbf of
weight on the bit. In this machine the
diesel engine drove the hydraulic power
pack from one end of the crankshaft and
the compressor was directly coupled to
the other. This concept was also used on
the next two drills to be launched. The
first one was a new crawler mounted
Blasthole Drilling in Open Pit Mining

Talking Technically

rig for rotary or downhole drilling, the

DM45 with 45,000lbf weight on bit.
This was followed by a conceptually
similar top drive rotary or DHD model,
the DM30 and a specialized rotary table
variant, the DM-35I, which was introduced in the 1980s for drilling underwater in phosphate mines. It featured a dual
kelly system that allowed explosives to
be charged through the annulus between
the outer and inner kelly. The inner kelly
would then be removed for blasting.
Later the DM 40SPi was developed for
drilling and shooting deeper holes.

Development of large
blasthole drills
Towards the end of the seventies, the
company started designing drill rigs
more specifically aimed at the base
metal mining market, using power
pack concepts developed for deephole
drilling. So far, neither air-powered nor
hydraulic drive rotary nor downhole
drills had challenged the electric motor
top drive rotary rigs manufactured in
the United States for the 12 15 inch
diameter hole market. These machines
by now had very high weights on bit
in the range 100,000 120,000 lbf,
partly due to the weight of the electric
motor for the rotary head, but were
not suitable for live tower operation.
Ingersoll-Rands first response was
in 1979 with the development of the
Drillmaster DM70, able to drill 10 inch
diameter holes in metal mines and up
to 12 inch holes at coal mines using
8.6 bar air for rotary drilling. And in
1979 the company launched the DM-H
(Drillmaster Heavy), the first truly
modern large blasthole drilling rig to
be used for low pressure rotary drilling
of 9 7/8 - 12 1/8 inch holes with bit loads
up to 90,000 lbf.
The DM-H used hydraulics for both
drilling and non-drilling functions and
featured a hydraulic propel excavator
type undercarriage with easily replaceable grouser pads and in-line components on the deck. It was equipped with
a rotary screw compressor and a live
tower with patented angle drilling
system. The tower pivot point was flush
to the drill deck and within the dust
curtain, reducing the length of unsupported drill rod. It was an all-purpose
Blasthole Drilling in Open Pit Mining

machine, with a single-pass version

added in the mid-1980's. The machine
has been upgraded over the years although replaced by the Pit Viper 351
for hard rock applications.
At much the same time the company
started to offer electric powered versions of the DM 45 and other models
if customers wanted them, for instance
for use in open pits where the other
key equipment was electric powered.
However, although these machines
had electric motor power packs they
retained the hydraulic rotation system.
The first electric drill rig was the
DM7B delivered to Clarksburg in 1977,
followed a year later by the DM100
delivered to Rock Springs.
After recovery from the recession
of the early 1980s, Ingersoll-Rand
launched a medium range Drillmaster,
the DM-M designed for rotary drilling of 9 7/8 inch holes with bit loads up
to 60,000 lbf. Three of the first four
DM-M's went into operation at Peabody
Energy's new Nor th Antelope &
Rochelle Mine in the Wyoming Powder
River Basin, now one of the two largest coal mines in the world. Now, over
25 years later, the prototype DM-M is
still in operation. The machine featured
a carriage feed system with wire rope
cables, resulting in a lighter tower and
lower center of gravity.
In 1989 this model was upgraded
to the DM-M2 on which maximum bit
load was increased to 75,000 lbf and the
hole size capability extended up to 10 5/8
inch. Stability was improved as well. In
1990-91 the company intro-duced the
DML for multi-pass drilling to 180 ft
hole depth.
This new model could drill from 6
to 9 7/8 inch (200 250 mm) diameter
holes in rotary mode, and 6 8 7/8 inch
using a downhole hammer. Following a
development project based on a customer
consultation exercise the DM-M3 was
launched at MINExpo 1992. Designed
primarily for deep drilling of overburden for cast blasting in large coal mines,
the first production DM-M3 went into
operation in 1993 at Arch Coal's Black
Thunder Mine, one of the largest coal
mines in the world.
For this new model, the designers raised bit load to 90,000 lbf and the hole
diameter range up to 12 inch while a

The DM-H, launched in 1979, could be used with

bit loads up to 90,000 lbf (400 kN).

The first Pit Viper 351 was launched in 2000 and

used at the Morenci copper mine in Arizona.

Milestones in development
Year

Model

Load on bit

1948

Quarrymaster drifter

1955

DM3

30,000 lbf

1968

T4BH

30,000 lbf

1969

DM4

40,000 lbf

1970

DM50

50,000 lbf

1979

DM-H

90,000 lbf

1983

DM-M

60,000 lbf

1990

DML

60,000 lbf

1992

DM-M3

90,000 lbf

2000

PV-351

125,000 lbf

2004

PV-270

75,000 lbf

2008

PV-235

65,000 lbf

Talking Technically

The Pit Viper 235 shown at MINExpo 2008.

Big picture: The electric PV-351E at the Boliden Aitik Mine. Inset: The workplace of today with RCS control
and automated functions.

new patented cable feed allowed the use

of 40 ft long drill rods.

The launch of the Pit Viper

Although difficult market conditions
restricted investment in the mid-1990s,
during 1997 the company started work
on a new generation blasthole drilling
rig design.
To differentiate this new range from
the Drillmaster series, which initially
was designed for drilling large holes
in coal mining and soft rock, this new
series was - from the very beginning
- specified and designed for production drilling of large holes in hard rock
conditions.
The first one out was the Pit Viper
351, which was successfully launched at
MINExpo 2000. Weighing 170 tonnes,
measuring 53 feet long, and equipped
with a CAN-bus control system with
seven on-board computers, the new Pit
Viper 351 was at that time the largest
and most advanced drill rig of its kind.
The advanced control system allowed
the drill pattern to be transmitted to
the drill rig via a radio network, and it
also featured production monitoring,
rock recognition and a GPS navigation
system.
10

A few months after the Minexpo

show, in April 2001, the PV-351 was
put to work at the Morenci copper mine
in Arizona for final testing and evaluation. The mine had a fleet of 16 drill
rigs from a variety of manufacturers, so
in addition to the new rig being used for
drilling in the hard igneous rock conditions, this was an excellent opportunity
for benchmarking the PV-351 with the
other brands.
The application required 12 inch
diameter single pass drilling of 57 ft
deep blastholes using up to 90,000 lbf
weight on bit (of the 125,000 lbf capacity). The test was successful: the PV-351
drilled some 2.2 million feet by August
2004 at a recorded average rate of 60,000
feet per month and in some months even
more than 80,000 feet per month.
Later the same year the multi-pass Pit
Viper 275 was launched at MINExpo
2004. Based on the experience from the
PV-351, combined with customer consultations, a project had been initiated
for development of the PV-270 series.
These drills were specified for a 75,000
lbf bit load capacity and were featured
a similar cable feed system and automatic cable tensioning to that on the
larger PV-351. The multipass version
PV-275 with a 195ft depth capacity was

delivered for a test in December 2003 at

Peabody's Kayenta coal mine in Arizona
where it was used for cast blast drilling
for removal of the overburden. This
first machine is still in use there and,
as a result of the good performance, the
mine decided to invest in several additional units. One of these is prepared for
quick change between a multi-pass and
a single-pass tower as an option to be
adapted for different applications at the
mine.
The first mine to use the single pass
version, the PV-271, was the Barrick
Goldstrike mine near Elko, Nevada.
Since the PV-271 arrived at the mine in
April 2004 it has been problem-free, and
holds an impressive track record with
an average penetration rate of 199 ft per
hour. The long component life and also
the automatic tensioning adjustments for
the cables are much appreciated by the
mine.
Following this tradition of product
launches in Las Vegas, the latest addition to the Pit Viper series - the PV-235
- was shown at MINExpo 2008. This
is an advanced mid- range drill for bit
loads up to 65,000 lbf, with the RCS Rig
Control System available as an option.

Acknowledgements
Editors: Kyran Casteel and Ulf Linder
Contributions: Guy Coyne, Ron Buell,
Kenneth Moffitt, Brian Fox, John
Stinson, Dustin Penn, Gunnar Nord,
Sverker Hartwig, Jim Langford, Diane
Norwood, Darwin Hollar, Ewald Kurt.
Blasthole Drilling in Open Pit Mining