On April 25, the country's first hob-type rock boring machine, developed by China Railway Construction Heavy Industry Corporation (CRCHI), was officially delivered and put into use at the Tongshankou Mine of Daye Nonferrous in Hubei, marking a major breakthrough in China's mining equipment technology, filling the technical gap in the field of non-full-face hard rock boring equipment, and driving China's mining methods from traditional blasting mining into a new era of green and intelligent mining.

Equipment delivered and put into use

Wu Dahong, Party Secretary of the Huangshi Emergency Management Bureau; Huang Jiangang, Director of the Daye Emergency Management Bureau; Hu Guobin, Party Secretary and Chairman of China Nonferrous Daye; and He Yongjun, Deputy Party Secretary and Deputy General Manager of CRCHI, attended the ceremony and posed for a group photo.

The Tongshankou Mine of Daye Nonferrous is mainly a copper-molybdenum mine, with proven copper ore resources of 1.253 million tonnes and molybdenum ore resources of 1.779 million tonnes. The engineering geological conditions of this equipment application are complex, with the average compressive strength of the rock strata at 80-120 MPa and the maximum compressive strength of local rock strata reaching as high as 240 MPa.

The country's first hob-type rock boring machine delivered this time is a new type of hard rock boring equipment integrating rock breaking, drilling and anchoring, loading, transport and dust removal. The equipment innovatively combines the strong rock-breaking capability of a TBM with the maneuverability and flexibility of a cantilever boring machine, successfully overcoming three key technical challenges in the field of hard rock boring: first, it pioneered non-full-face cold excavation boring technology for 150 MPa hard rock, improving boring efficiency by three times compared with traditional blasting methods; second, it built a full-process, full-flow intelligent collaborative system covering boring, support and transport, reducing working-face personnel by 60%; third, it achieved a breakthrough in adaptability technology for complex geological conditions, and can be widely used in coal mines, non-coal mines, tunnels and other hard rock boring scenarios. These breakthrough innovations effectively address the pain points faced by traditional blasting mining, such as high safety risks, dense personnel, cross-operation of processes and limited construction efficiency, providing a new solution for safe and efficient mining.

The successful application of the country's first hob-type rock boring machine has created a new mining model that is "safe, efficient, green and intelligent." Its engineering practice at the Tongshankou Mine not only provides reliable technical equipment support for the development of deep mineral resources in China, but will also accelerate the process of intelligent mine construction and inject strong momentum into the high-quality development of the entire mining industry.