Cause and Solution to Roadway Deformation in Vietnam Underground Coal Mines

The deformation and support method of roadways have always been important issues in safemining and production. Vinacomin's statistics show that, by 2021, there will be 64.19 km of roadwaysthat need to be repaired (accounting for 25% of the total new roadways). Thus, the problem of maintainingroadway stability is facing difficulties in underground coal mines in Vietnam. To find out the causes ofroadway failures, a case study at roadways of the Khe Cham I and Khe Cham III coal mines, Vietnam, ispresented in this paper. Based on the results of a detailed field survey, the deformation characteristics ofroadways and the failure mode of support structures were investigated. The results show that the roadwaydeformation is severe and the main support cannot control surrounding rock mass. Also, the destructionof support structure is frequent on reused roadways, affecting production efficiency and work safety.Therefore, to reduce deformation and increase roadway stability, a new support method called “multistageanchor of rock bolt + cable bolt” has been developed and a new longwall mining system with criticalcoal pillar width has been proposed. The new findings of the research can provide references for scientificstudies, and apply them in Vietnam's underground coal mine practices.

Desorption and Transport of Temperature-Pressure Effect on Adsorbed Gas in Coal Samples from Zhangxiaolou Mine, China

The development of coal seam fissures and gas migration process caused by mining disturbance has an extremely important influence on gas control and roadway stability. In this study, the desorption, diffusion, and migration tests of adsorbed gas under the coupling effect of temperature and uniaxial compression were conducted on four coal samples from Zhangxiaolou mine, using the temperature and pressure coupling test system of deep coal rocks. The test confirms that the higher the temperature, the faster the desorption and emission of the adsorbed gases in the coal, and the larger the volume of the emitted gases. Meanwhile, it is found that the adsorbed gases in the coal samples of Zhangxiaolou mine are carbon dioxide and methane in the order of content. It is found that during the uniaxial compression process, several large negative values of the pressure of the emitted gas occur during the stable growth stage of the crack. This indicates that the crack expansion makes a new negative pressure space inside the coal sample, and the negative pressure values increase continuously during the unstable growth phase of the crack until the coal sample is destroyed. And after the axial pressure is removed, the escaped gas pressure shows a large positive value due to the rebound of the coal matrix and the continuous desorption of a large amount of adsorbed gas from the new crack location, which has a significant hysteresis with respect to the occurrence of the peak stress. Meanwhile, the SEM images of the coal samples before and after the test are analyzed to confirm the cause of the negative pressure generation.

Research on Hydraulic Fracturing Pressure Relief Technology in the Deep High-Stress Roadway for Surrounding Rock Control

With the increase of mining depth in underground engineering, deep ground pressure has an extremely unfavorable impact on safety production and the economic benefits of coal mines and the control of the roadway stability in deep mines are gradually highlighted. In this study, the working face 14203 of the Zaoquan coal mine was taken as the engineering background, the deformation mechanism of surrounding rock in the deep-buried high-stress roadway was analyzed, and the hydraulic fracturing pressure relief technology in the advanced roadway was proposed for surrounding rock control. Finally, the numerical simulation and field tests were used to validate the comprehensive effect of the proposed technology. Without damaging the roadway stability in the working face, the hydraulic fracturing pressure relief technology can optimize the stress environment and stability of the roadway through the artificial control of the roof fracture position. The numerical simulation shows that under the action of hydraulic fracturing, the cutting slot is formed, the deformation and failure mode of the roof are changed, the stress of surrounding rock is reduced, and the development of the plastic zone of surrounding rock is limited. As a result, the stability of surrounding rock in the roadway is effectively protected. The field test shows that after the adoption of hydraulic fracturing pressure relief technology, the roof subsidence, floor separation, bolt stress, and cable stress decrease, and the deformation of surrounding rock is reduced significantly. Therefore, hydraulic fracturing pressure relief technology is verified as an effective method to control the large deformation of the surrounding rock in the deep-buried roadway.

Numerical Analysis of the Effect of Heterogeneity on Underground Roadway Stability under Dynamic Loads

With the increasing depth of coal mining and expanding mining scale, the rocks surrounding deep roadways are in a complex mechanical condition of frequent dynamic disturbance. The heterogeneity has an important influence on rock mass failure under dynamic loads. Therefore, it is necessary to study the deformation and failure of heterogeneous roadway under dynamic load. In this paper, the effect of heterogeneity on stability of roadway under static and different dynamic loads is studied. According to the results, the effect of rock mass heterogeneity on the deformation and failure of surrounding rock varies with different degrees of heterogeneity. Under static loading conditions, the stability of roadway is negatively correlated with the degree of heterogeneity of the rock mass. Under dynamic loading conditions, the change of heterogeneity degree has significant influence on the stability of surrounding rock. With the increase in dynamic load strength, the change in variation difference in the average value of roof sag, stress distribution, and plastic zone caused by variations in heterogeneity will increase. This study contributes to understanding the deformation and failure characteristics of heterogeneous roadways under dynamic loads and can be used to analyze heterogeneous roadways under dynamic loads.

Stability Analysis of Roadway Groups under Multi-Mining Disturbances

The roadway stability has been regarded as the main challenging issue for safety and productivity of deep underground coal mines, particularly where roadways are affected by coal mining activities. This study investigates the −740 m main roadway in the Jining No. 2 Coal Mine to provide a theoretical basis for the stability control of the main deep roadway affected by disturbances of adjacent working activities. Field surveys, theoretical analyses, and numerical simulations are used to reveal mechanisms of the coal mining disturbance. The field survey shows that the deformation of roadway increases when the work face advances near the roadway group. Long working face mining causes the key strata to collapse based on the key strata theory and then disturbs the adjacent roadway group. When the working face is 100 m away from the stop-mining line, the roadway group is affected by the mining face, and the width roadway protection coal pillar is determined to be about 100 m. Flac3D simulations prove the accuracy of the theoretical result. Through reinforcement and support measures for the main roadway, the overall strength of the surrounding rock is enhanced, the stability of the surrounding rock of the roadway is guaranteed, and the safe production of the mine is maintained.

Instability Control of Roadway Surrounding Rock in Close-Distance Coal Seam Groups under Repeated Mining

In order to solve the problems of roadway stability and easy instability under repeated mining of close-distance coal seam groups, the mechanism and control technology of surrounding rock instability under repeated mining were studied via indoor testing, field testing, physical similarity simulation experiment, and numerical simulation. The results show that the surrounding rock of roadway has low strength, low bearing capacity, and poor self-stabilization ability, and it is vulnerable to engineering disturbances and fragmentation. Affected by the disturbance under repeated mining, the roadway surrounding rock cracks are developed and the sensitivity is strong, and it is prone to large-scale loose and destroyed. The location of the roadway is unreasonable, and the maximum principal stress of the roadway is 3.1 times of the minimum principal stress, which is quite different. Thus, under a large horizontal stress, the surrounding rock undergoes long-range expansion deformation. On the basis of this research, the direction and emphasis of stability control of roadway surrounding rock under repeated mining of coal seam groups in close-distance are shown. A repair scheme (i.e., long bolt + high-strength anchor cable + U-shaped steel + grouting) is proposed, and reduces the risk of roadway instability.

Measurements of Excavation Damaged Zone by Using Fiber Bragg Grating Stress Sensors

In this paper, a Fiber Bragg Grating (FBG) stress sensor is developed to measure the stress variation between the lower Excavation Damaged Zone (EDZ) and the upper undistributed rock. The disturbance brought by the environmental temperature can be differentially compensated with two FBGs mounted symmetrically on the spokes. Through finite element analysis, it can be known that the direct stress and shear stress are pointed at the angles of 45° and 60° on both sides of the coal mine roadway, respectively. The anchor ends of the sensors are installed into the upper undistributed rock and the bolt tails of the mine roadway with a depth of 700 m and fastened by nuts to secure the load sensing device on the surface of the rock. When the shallow foundation of surrounding rock is pressed and deformed toward the coal mining road, the structural modifications can be converted into the stress of rock bolt and the strain of spoke. Thus, the FBG mounted on the surface of the spoke receives the shift information of the Bragg wavelength. The monitoring results indicate that the FBG stress sensors are sensitive to the variation of the EDZ. During the blasting, the stress amplitude varies from 40.256 to 175.058 kPa, and the creep time changes from 21 to 74 min. The proposed method can be applied in the field of underground coal mines for safety condition monitoring of the EDZ and forecasting the coal mine roadway stability.

Measurement and Analysis of Roadway Deformation and Stress under Mining-Induced Stress

Small coal pillars, which are used to protect roadways, have a significant influence on mining operations and roadway stability and safety. Consequently, the optimal width of coal pillars that provides suitable performance under mining-induced stress must be determined accurately. Based on the deformation data of the surrounding rock along the gob roadway of the 13318 working face in Xieqiao Coal Mine, we analyzed the surface deformation data of the roadway and the displacement of the deep surrounding rock of the roadway under the action of mining-induced stress herein. The separation fractures of the low side of the roadway can be divided into four zones: 0–2 m, 2–5 m, 5–9 m, and 9–11 m. The absolute displacement of the surrounding rock relative to the center of the roadway in the 0–2 m zone was large, and the displacement region in the side of the roadway extended from 0 m to 11 m. The separation fractures of the high side of the roadway can be divided into three zones: 0–3 m, 3–5 m, and 5–5.5 m. The absolute displacement of the surrounding rock relative to the center of the roadway in the 0–3 m zone was large, whereas the deformation separation of the coal pillar was small. The surrounding rock in the 5–5.5 m zone also exhibited absolute displacement relative to the center of the roadway. Furthermore, the stress increased faster on the low side of the roadway than the high side; the core stress region on the high side occurred at approximately 3 m, whereas that on the low side occurred at approximately 8 m. The findings obtained herein can help determine the optimal preset width of small pillars.

Width Design of Small Coal Pillar of Gob-Side Entry Driving in Soft Rock Working Face and Its Application of Zaoquan Coal Mine

Reasonable width of gob-side coal pillar can reduce the waste of coal resources and is conducive to roadway stability. According to the distribution of internal and external stress fields at the working face, a method for determining the width of gob-side coal pillar was proposed. The coal pillar and roadway should be set within the internal stress field, and support is provided through the anchored part and the intact part of the coal pillar. The method was used in the design of the coal pillar at No. 130205 working face of Zaoquan Coal Mine. The calculation results indicated that the width of a coal pillar suitable for gob-side entry is 6.0 m. It is reasonable to arrange the roadway and coal pillar in the low-stress zone with a width of 11 m. During tunnelling of roadway and stoping of the working face, the deformation of the roadway increased with a reduction in the distance from the working face. Even during stoping of the working face, there was an approximately 1.5 m intact zone in the coal pillar. This indicates that the proposed method of designing small coal pillar of gob-side entry driving is reliable.

Research on Supporting Method for High Stressed Soft Rock Roadway in Gentle Dipping Strata of Red Shale

Red shale is widely distributed among the deep mine areas of Kaiyang Phosphate Mine, which is the biggest underground phosphate mine of China. Because of the effect of various factors, such as high stress, ground water and so on, trackless transport roadways in deep mine areas were difficult to effectively support for a long time by using traditional supporting design methods. To deal with this problem, some innovative works were carried out in this paper. First, mineral composition and microstructure, anisotropic, hydraulic mechanical properties and other mechanical parameters of red shale were tested in a laboratory to reveal its deformation and failure characteristics from the aspect of lithology. Then, some numerical simulation about the failure process of the roadways in layered red shale strata was implemented to investigate the change regulation of stress and strain in the surrounding rock, according to the real rock mechanical parameters and in-situ stress data. Therefore, based on the composite failure law and existing support problems of red shale roadways, some effective methods and techniques were adopted, especially a kind of new wave-type bolt that was used to relieve rock expansion and plastic energy to prevent concentration of stress and excess deformation. The field experiment shows the superiorities in new techniques have been verified and successfully applied to safeguard roadway stability.