A total of 50 million m³ of mostly hard rock needed to be removed for construction of the new, ultra-modern deep water seaport in Doha, Qatar.
The project was awarded to China Harbour Construction Company (CHCC) which originally planned to complete the job in a conventional manner using drilling and blasting.
But, due to the economic and ecological advantages of the
In this well-established mechanical mining procedure, surface miners cut and crush the rock with a special cutting drum before transferring it into dumpers via sturdy conveyor systems, all in a single pass. Alternatively, the rock can be placed alongside the machine or laid in windrows between the tracks.
“As a result, surface miners are very flexible to use. They have cutting widths of 2.2-4.2m and cut down to depths of 20-83cm at a uniaxial compressive strength of up to 120MPa,” says Wirtgen.
Special machines for rock construction can even cut hard granite up to 260MPa.
The rock to be mined in the Doha project was characterised by an unconfined compressive strength of 35MPa with the production rate of the Wirtgen 2500 SM being 400tonnes/hour.
Wirtgen claims to be the only manufacturer that can offer a performance range of 100-3,000tonnes/hour.
For the project in Doha, the company bought a Wirtgen 2500 SM surface miner with a cutting width of 2.5m and a working depth of up to 600mm. In addition to this, CHCC was able to rely on the application services of an experienced Wirtgen team.
“After all, the amount of rock mined is not the only important criteria for using surface miners. Facts such as the geological composition of the location, sedimentation or logistic requirements play an important role as well,” says Wirtgen.
“Here, the knowledge of experts and best practice are required. This is why both the local dealer in Qatar and Wirtgen application specialists accompanied the customer as partners for the entire duration of the project.
“The miner’s excellent cutting results and the reliable after-sales service offered by Wirtgen convinced CHCC so that two additional 2500 SM machines reported for duty in Qatar.”
