Wear & Tear tests

Wear & Tear tests on potential liner materials for the Vertical Transport System

Blue Mining focuses on developing breakthrough solutions for a Vertical Transport System. This implies developing the ability to ensure an adequate lifetime for the Vertical Transport System. Hereto the wear & tear of various potential liner materials is investigated.

As in any pump pipeline system transporting solids the Vertical Transport System will wear as a result of the ore colliding with the inside liner. In Blue Mining the impact of the transported solids on the liner is quantified by developing state of the art numerical models which establish a.o. the impact angles and velocities as a function of flow conditions like mixture velocity and concentration. The wear & tear resulting from this impact is investigated for various potential liner materials by conducting wear tests.

At TNO in Eindhoven (the Netherlands) a demonstration of the wear tests was organized. Besides an elaborate explanation of the wear test facility this demonstration also included the presentation of first results on candidate materials like various types of steel and polymers. The demonstration was concluded by defining opportunities regarding the performance of wear & tear tests during Blue Mining’s future large scale demonstration tests.

Paul Vercruijsse (DI)