RR. Solid Lab Exercises

Owned by iarmstrong
Last updated: Apr 26, 2023
8 min read

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The following are some examples of how to use the Solid Lab tab functionality.

Please go through each exercise to practice running different operations on the demo dataset.

Many of these operations can be included in one Operation set to achieve a final outcome.

 

Creating final phase solid for Pit1 Stage 2

Example, the following operations can be performed in one Operation Set to achieve a final phase solid for Pit1 Stage 2.

Clipping a Surface

Use Clip Surface by Polygons operation to reduce the size of a surface file. Loading smaller files into memory excluding data not required.

  1. Import surface file (can be imported from a file or from the Layers panel).

  2. Drag & drop files from the Layers to the Operations panel, click on the icon and drag.

  3. Using the polygon tool draw a polygon around the area required.

  4. Run the operation by pressing the blue triangle sign.

  5. Click on Result row to see the outcome in the viewport.

  6. Click on the green arrow icon to save the result to the Layers panel.

Creating a Solid for a Pit Stage

This operation is used for a pit containing 2 phases, to create a solid phase of Stage 2 excluding Stage 1.

To run this operation the following surface files are required:

  • upper surface topography (preferably clipped),

  • design surface file for Pit1_Stage1,

  • design surface file for Pit1_Stage2.

  1. Create a solid above the Pit1_Stage2 design.

  2. Create a solid below the Pit1_Stage1 design and the natural surface file.

Intersecting Solids

  1. Intersect the 2 solids.

    1. When intersecting solids click on the row with the added solids. In the viewport, you will see two solids, one above the other, as shown below. This is not a very clear example, as we cannot really see intersecting area.

      1. For better clarity, change the transparency of these solids.

      2. Rotate the resultant solids for better seeing the overlapping area. This area is the result of the intersection.

Cleaning Solid from Remnant Blocks

As a result of overlapping solids and surfaces, you can see a lot of remnant blocks around the resultant solid that you want to remove to facilitate further scheduling. Two basic methods to accomplish this goal are outlined below.

Method 1. Reducing Complexity

To clean remnant solids use Reduce Complexity option from Add Operation dropdown. This operation allows small remnant solids to be removed from a larger solid.

  1. Add operation Reduce Complexity and from Solid dropdown select solid to import, or drag and drop it from the Layers panel.

  2. Specify:

    1. Minimum Volume accepted,

    2. Maximum Error - triangulation error limit,

    3. Pinch Tolerance to remove smaller volume areas. All solids with a volume below this value will be removed.

  3. Run the operations by pressing the blue play button.

  4. Select the Result row to see the result in the viewport.

Method 2. Creating Solid From Polygon

  1. Add new operation - Create Solid From Polygons.

  2. In the Layers panel, toggle pit1_s2 solid, resulting from intersection and subtraction operations.

  3. Draw a closed polygon around the solid area to keep using the Create Polygon tool from the top toolbar.

    1. Make sure that the drawn polygon is closed, otherwise, you’ll get an error message.

    2. Excluded from the polygon area will be removed from the final solid.

  4. Using the up and down arrows, place the Create Solid From Polygons operation in front of Intersect Solids operation.

  5. Add the outputs of operations #1, #2 and #3 to the Intersect Solids operation.

  6. Run the operations by pressing the blue play button.

  7. Select the Result row to see the result in the viewport.

If all steps are done correctly, you should get a result like on the right - a solid with smoother boundaries, without extra remnant artefacts, fitting the outlined polygon.

Display the original solid to see the difference.

Creating Dump Solids

Creating Dump Solid from Surfaces (Dump design surface and Survey surface).

To create dump solid the following surface files are required:

  • upper surface topography,

  • design surface file for Dump1.

  1. Create a solid above surface topography design.

  2. Create a solid below the Dump1 design and the natural surface file.

  3. Intersect the two solids.

  4. Run the operations by pressing the blue play button.

  5. Select the Result row to see the result in the viewport.

  6. Save the result to the Layers panel as “Dump1_Solid”.

Repeat to create solids for Dump2, Dump3 and LowGrade.

Creating BackFill Phase Solid

Below is an example of generating a backfill stage solid, which can come in handy when a certain part of the pit is fully mined and can be backfilled with a waste material.

Creating Solid from Surfaces

To get the result of the backfill stage, the following surface files are required:

  • upper surface topography (preferably clipped),

  • design surface file for Pit1_Stage1.

  1. Create a solid above the Pit1_Stage1 design.

  2. Create a solid below the topo surface file.

Creating Solid Below Plane

  1. Use the Create Solid Below Plane operation:

    1. To limit the resulting solid to the specific RL, create a plane solid at 803 on the Z axis.

    2. Cut the Pit1_Stage1 solid by plane with 37.5 dip to generate a solid with the given slope.

      1. Use the Place a Plane tool from the top toolbar. Left-click and rotate as required to determine the position for backfilling within the pit stage design.

Intersecting Solids

  1. Add the outputs of operations #1, #2, #3 and #4 to the Intersect Solids operation.

  2. Run the operations by pressing the blue play button.

  3. Select the Result row to see the result in the viewport.

  4. Save the result to the Layers panel as “bf1”.

If all steps are done correctly, you should get a result like on the right. Display the Pit1_Stage1 solid to see where the generated backfilling area is located.

Import the resulting solid as a Phase in the Phases setup step, and using Z-plane slider check for the overlap between pit1_s1 and bf1 solids. More details see in the RR. Phases > Checking for Overlaps section.

Creating TopSoil and SubSoil Solids

Sometimes you may need to schedule topsoil and subsoil separately from the main pit volume, to allow for the further rehabilitation. In this case, you can create a discrete surface a given number of meters below the topography, and use it to generate a topsoil solid, to which you can assign its own parcel and scheduling logic.

Creating TopSoil Surface

To create a TopSoil surface, translate the natural surface to the required distance.

  1. Use the Translate Solid or Surface operation:

    1. Add topography as a Solid/Surface.

    2. Translate it by 0.15 meters below.

  2. Run the operations by pressing the blue play button.

  3. Select the Result row to see the result in the viewport. Zoom into to see the difference between original topo and translated topsoil surfaces Zs.

  4. Save the result to the Layers panel.

Creating TopSoil Solid

To get the result of the topsoil solid, the following surface files are required:

  • upper surface topography (preferably clipped),

  • design surface file for Pit1_Stage1,

  • topsoil surface, generated in the previous step.

  1. Create a solid above Pit1_Stage1 design and topsoil surface.

  2. Create a solid below surface topography design.

  3. Draw a closed polygon around pit stage area to keep.

  4. Intersect all these operations outputs.

  5. Run the operations by pressing the blue play button.

  6. Select the Result row to see the result in the viewport.

  7. Save the result to the Layers panel as “pit_s1_ts”.

Repeat these steps to create solids for SubSoil being 0.10 below original topography Z.

Import these solids as Phases and attribute them with specific parcels (created in the Block Model Gap Filling step and assigned in the Phase Details step). Schedule as normal.

Creating Inner Stage

Creating Pit Solid From Polygon at Top

  1. Use the operation Create Pit Solid From Polygon at Top. Pit solid will be created from a polygon, top down.

    1. Display Pit1_Stage1 solid in the viewport.

    2. Draw a closed polygon inside, following an area of interest.

    3. Specify Z. New stage solid will be generated from this level down.

    4. Specify Number of Benches this inner stage will consist of. Note that ramps are not going to be generated; to define a ramp you'll need to set it as Blast Type property in the Designer tab.

    5. Specify Bench Height, Batter Angle and Berm Width. Can be used for creating inner stages.

  2. Run the operations by pressing the blue play button.

  3. Select the Result row to see the result in the viewport.

Creating Lower Surface from Solid

  1. Use the operation Lower Surface to generate a lower surface of the created solid, that can be used as that inner stage design surface.

    1. Use the generated from polygon solid as an input.

  2. Run the operations by pressing the blue play button.

  3. Select the Result row to see the result in the viewport.

  4. Save the result to the Layers panel.

 

Note

If, after generating solids in the Solid Lab, you encounter a problem as shown on the right, it can be due to the Subtract Solids operation. Such irregular lines can result from subtracting a solid from a set of solids with a common top surface. Because this operation only subtracts the solid, the vertices and triangles of the top surface may have remained and lead to the formation of such lines extending from them.