A Fuzzy Approach to Selecting Roof Supports in Longwall Mining

Abstract

As a decision-making problem, selecting proper machines and equipment plays a key role for mining sites and companies. Many factors affect this decision, and values belonging to these factors can be expressed numerically and/or non-numerically. In order to make the most appropriate decision, engineers must carry out an evaluation process that comprises all criteria that might affect decision-making. To achieve this, multi-criteria decision-making tools are used. As a result of technological developments, coal outputs in longwall mining have risen tremendously over the last decades, and longwall mechanisation has become unavoidable. The significance of powered roof supports in particular increases dayby-day, since the rate of roof support has to be in accordance with the rate of face advance in longwalls.In this study, an integrated fuzzy analytic hierarchy process and fuzzy goal programming model is used to select the most suitable powered roof supports. The procedure is applied to a real-life underground coal mine that is operated using the longwall method. Seven alternative powered roof supports are compared with each other, taking a total of 24 decision criteria under four main topics into account. In conclusion, the most suitable roof supports for the mine under study are determined and recommended to the decision-makers of the system. OPSOMMINGʼn Die selekteer van die regte masjinerie en toerusting speel ʼn sleutelrol vir myn werwe en mynmaatskappye. Daar is baie faktore wat dié besluit beïnvloed en numeriese of nie-numeriese waardes kan aan hierdie faktore toegeken word. Om die regte besluit te neem, moet ingenieurs al die kriteria wat die besluit mag beïnvloed oorweeg. Hiervoor word multi-kriteria besluitnemingstrategieë gebruik. As gevolg van tegnologiese ontwikkelinge, het die steenkoolontginning van ondergrondse myne drasties toegeneem en is meganisering van dié myne onvermeidelik. Die belang van aangedrewe plafonstutte het veral toegeneem as gevolg van die vinnige tempo van skag verlenging.ʼn Wasige analitiese hiërargieproses en wasige doelbeplanningsmodel word gebruik om die gepaste aangedrewe plafonstutte te kies. Die prosedure word toegepas op ʼn ondergrondse steenkoolmyn. Sewe aangedrewe plafonstutte word met mekaar vergelyk; die vergelyking neem 24 besluitnemingskriteria, wat onder vier hoofafdelings verdeel is, in ag. Gevolglik word die mees geskikte plafonstut gekies en aanbeveel.

Relative Position and Posture Detection of Hydraulic Support Based on Particle Swarm Optimization

“…In long-wall mining, hydraulic support plays an important role in roof support and mining working face advancement. Since the shearer needs to use scraper conveyor as the track, to ensure the normal walking of the shearer, the speed of the roof support must be consistent with the advancing speed of mining working face, while requiring mining working face to maintain straight [7]. In the early stage, the manual correction was used to solve the bending problem of fully mechanized mining face.…”

Selection of coal transportation mode from the open pit mine to the thermic power plant using Fuzzy Analytic Hierarchy Process

“…Finally, in the decision phase, the weighted sum of ratings belonging to each alternative are calculated where the weights are the ones from FGP model. (Mizrak Ozfirat et al 2015;Yetkin et al 2016). The detailed step-by-step approach is given below.…”

“…Finally, Eqs (16) and (17) define the decision variables domains. The FGP model is solved to give the final priorities for all decision criteria (Mizrak Ozfirat et al 2015;Yetkin et al 2016). In addition, the value of λ in the model gives us the level of consistency.…”

A Systems Approach to Analysing Work Efficiency in Power Control Rooms: A Case Study

“…The analysis of the complex system described here is based on the application of a systems approach and the fuzzy analytic hierarchy process. Since its initial development, the analytic hierarchy process (AHP) and fuzzy AHP (FAHP) have been applied in many areas in risk assessment, control room development, and process safety assessment -such as the assessment of the human-machine interface [22], estimating the risk of accidents [23], the quantitative estimation of human error probability [24], accident scenario risk assessment [25], and skill measurement and identification of the performance indicators of industrial operators [26,27]. The procedure for decomposing the elements of a decision-making problem into smaller parts and a pairwise comparison of the elements with fuzzy numbers is used to define the priority of elements in the hierarchy of ergonomic research.…”