The choice of the energy level for shock destruction of material

Abstract

The authors describe a study to obtain a detailed evaluation of the potential of the method of shock destruction with a view to its possible applications for the design of shock-based working elements for certain types of mining and construction machines. Two loading schemes were investigated in the study of shock destruction of materials: the first involves the destruction of finite specimens such as non-standard lumps of rocks, plates, and block materials, and the second is typical for the engineering processes separating a layer of material in excavation and mining. It is shown that the experimental relations for certain parameters of the shock process, expressed as a function of a sequence of consecutive shocks against a wedge indenter, indicate drastic variations of their values from one stroke to another. The authors adopted a pneumatic principle for shock-action devices which is described here. The experimental data were used to design a series of shock devices with unit stroke energies ranging from 1000 to 2500 J.