Radiation detection systems
Mining Plant Uranium Ore Discriminator
Mining Plant Uranium Ore Discriminator (MPUOD)
The Mining Plant Uranium Ore Discriminator (MPUOD) has been developed for the selective mining of surface uranium ore deposits. The MPUOD identifies ore, which ore grade is above the selected ore grade threshold, so such ore could be selectively mined and loaded onto a truck.
General operation:
The MPUOD detects of the gamma radiation by a Gamma Detector Unit (GDU) that is situated in front of the blade of the mining plant. The GDU detects the gamma radiation that is emitted from a 2 m wide 'strip' of ore. The GDU contains one pair of shielded gamma radiation detectors (GRDs) coupled with a high voltage/amplifier board.
The total gamma count is processed by a micro controller based Discriminator Control Panel (DCP) that is situated inside the mining plant operator cabin: The gamma pulses are counted in the 1, 2, 3, 4 or 5 min counting window, the background count is subtracted from the total count and the net count is multiplied by the count rate to the ore grade conversion factor. The average U3O8 grade (ppm) is displayed on the LCD.
The MPUOD has 5 uranium Ore Grade Thresholds (OGs) (the OGs are programmed by four momentary switches below the LCD of the DCP).
For the simplicity of the operation 5 OGs are also identified by 5 different color LEDs. The operator reports by a radio to a truck driver the 'color' of ore grade that was loaded and the truck driver dumps ore on the stockpile that has the same color coding.
In order to increase the mining rate it is recommended to use the MPUOD in association with the RDS GPS U-Grade Survey Monitor (UGSM). The UGSM is used to 'map' the ore grade of the surface of the uranium orebody. The iso-curves of ore grades are digitized so the mining plant that is equipped with a GPS could mine uranium ore more selectively.