Rock Cutting Tools

Dr. M. Z. Abu Bakar

 Rock Cutting Tools
• Several types of cutting tools are available for mechanically
fracturing the rock.
• They all must either fracture the rock by the normal force that is
applied either by hammering, applying a large thrust or both, the
shearing force that is applied, or a new type of force, the rolling
force that is applied.
 There are an array of five tools (Ozedemir,1990).
• Drag Picks
 Conical Shape;
 Blunt Shape;
• Smooth Disk Cutter;
• Toothed Roller;
• Multi-Button Cutter;
• Impactor (Both with and without added shear force)
 Mechanical Abrading (Water Jet)
 Cutting Lip of BWE and a Cutting Blade of a Soft Rock TBM.

 Geometry of Drag Pick Cutting
•In addition to cut spacing and bit
penetration, other parameters
affecting the performance of drag
cutters are the bit rake and clearance
angles.

Abu Bakar and Gertsch (2012)

 The Millennium Arch at Missouri
Jet cutting at the front edge of a pick University of Science and Technology.
(Front cover of the 8th International (Each vertical leg of the Arch is some 15
Symposium on Jet Cutting Technology, ft long, and the figures removed are in
BHRA, Durham, UK, Sept. 1986) the background, are 11 ft tall).
•Which of the tools will develop the largest particle size and
therefore always have the lowest Specific Energy?

• You can’t tell, can you, since you don’t know what type of
material that the tool will be cutting, what the spacing between
tool is, nor what type of machine that it will be on.

•So it’s time that we discuss Specific Energy (SE) in some

detail, so we can start getting an idea of how to minimize it.
 Specific Energy (SE)
• The concept of SE is extremely important, since it makes
you realize that any rock breaking/excavating system that
does not pulverize the rock and waste energy, but rather
breaks the rock into larger pieces, will be the most efficient
from an SE point of view.
• SE is the amount of energy required to fragment a unit
volume or mass of rock.
• The lower the amount of energy consumed per unit volume
of rock the better.
• Rittinger’s law states that the amount of new surface area
created will use a proportional amount of energy.
(Ozedemir, 1990)
(a) Disc cutter of a TBM consisting of a bearing casing and a replaceable cutter ring. Cutter
rings vary due to the type of encountered ground. (b) Multiple
edge cutter ring with cemented carbide studs (adopted from Kupferle et al., 2017).
Schematic cutter head of a TBM equipped with different tool concepts. Reamer,
chisel (and ripper) tools are commonly used in soil. Disc cutters are mainly used for hard
rock.
 Normal wear of cutter ring. Plastic deformations of cutter ring.

Spalling of cutter ring.

(Frenzel, 2011) Exposed seal due to wear of the seal retainer.
 Secondary wear on the hub.
Fretting at disc cutter bearings.

Totally destroyed single disc cutter. Totally destroyed center cutters

• Fretting refers to wear and
sometimes corrosion damage at the asperities of
contact surfaces. This damage is induced under load
and in the presence of repeated relative surface
motion, as induced for example by vibration
(a) Initial state of a disc cutter ring. (b) worn disc flanks due to excavation in soil. (c) localized
wear of the cutting edge due to a blocked disc cutter (adopted from Kupferle et al., 2017).
(a) Worn chisel tool and (b) worn reamer tool. Both tools consist of a substrate material,
cemented carbide inserts and build-up weldments made of metal-matrix composites
(MMCs) (Kupferle et al., 2017).
•Drag picks are unsuitable for excavation in rock where the
UCS exceeds 80 MPa (11,600 psi); feasible UCS may be no
more than 40-50 MPa (5800-7250 psi) when the rock is
abrasive or massive (Roxborough and Sen, 1986).

•Use of high pressure waterjet has been reported to have

increased a roadheader’s cutting capability to 150 MPa
(22,000 psi) compressive strength (Summers, 1995) (Abu
Bakar, 2012).

•Cone type bits with tungsten carbide button inserts, are only
used these days on tricone small hole (8 to 26 inch) drills, and
some raise boring applications in hard rock.

•Single disc cutters are normally used on TBM.

A raise borer cutterhead equipped with multi-row cone cutters
 TBM Disc Cutters
(Ozdemir, 1990)
• According to Levent Ozdemir of CSM, “The development and
introduction of single disc cutters on TBMs has made a
significant contribution to the success of the mechanical
tunnel boring industry by significantly improving machine
performance, as well as allowing the economical boring of
harder and more abrasive rock formations than previously
considered feasible. Since their introduction, disc cutter
design and performance has improved steadily. The cutter
size has increased to permit higher edge loadings and
therefore, deeper penetrations. Cutter metallurgy has also
improved dramatically, together with longer lasting seals and
bearings. As a result of refinements, disc cutter costs have
continued to decline, further enhancing the economics of
tunnel boring, particularly in hard and abrasive rock
formations”.
 Disc Cutter Design

The disc cutter geometry is

defined by its diameter and
edge profile. The cut
spacing and the depth of
cutter penetration into the
rock per cutterhead
revolution define the
geometry of the cutting
process [Hood and
Roxborough, 1992)
• Earlier disc cutters utilized on TBMs featured a V-shaped edge
profile with an included angle varying from 60 to 120 degrees.

• This profile provided high rates of advance when the cutter was new,
its performance, as expected, dropped rapidly as edge wear
developed and the rock-cutter contact area became larger.

• To ensure a more consistent cutting performance with increasing

edge wear, the constant-cross section (CCS) cutters were developed
in late 1970’s.

• The CCS cutters are designed to maintain a more or less constant

profile as edge wear occurs. This means the machine performance
does not decline as rapidly with cutter wear.

• The CCS cutters are less susceptible to edge fracturing in hard rock
formations.
 (Abu Bakar, 2012)

Herrenknecht 17 inch single disc cutter

Single disc cutters (Herrenknecht cutter tools, 2012). cross-section (Frenzel, 2011).
• The ring diameter is another variable which affects disc cutter performance.

• Disc cutters have steadily grown in size from about 8 inches to present day
17, 19 and 20 inch cutters.

• For the same thrust load on the cutter, increased diameter causes a reduction
in the depth of cutter penetration into the rock because of larger cutter
footprint area.

• However, larger cutters provide for higher bearing capacity which more
than offsets the performance loss brought about by the longer cutter-rock
contact area.

• Larger cutters rotate slower for a given machine rpm which means less heat
generation during boring.

• They also contain more cutter material to wear out before replacement
becomes necessary, again contributing to longer ring life. All these features
combined thus lead to improved cutter life and reduced excavation costs.
•The CCS cutters come in different edge widths.
•In general, the narrow-section cutters are utilized on center and
face positions on the TBMs to achieve the highest production rate.

•The wide-edge CCS cutters, are usually employed on the gage

area where the cutter penetration depths are small and the
additional wear material which the wide-section provide acceptable
cutter life in this high cutter wear zone.

•The entire machine can, of course, also be fitted all with narrow or
wide edge cutters to suit the hardness and/or abrasiveness of rock
to be excavated.

•The cutter ring is subject to the highest wear of a disc cutter and is
exposed to high contact pressure. Hence, special materials need to
be used for cutter rings. Commonly, alloy steels and tool steels
treated to about 56 to 60 HRC are utilized.
Center Cutters
Face Cutters

Gauge Cutters
Rock Failure under a Disc Cutter (Indenter)

(Abu Bakar, 2012)

(Rostami and Ozdemir, 1995).

When an indenter is loaded on a rock surface, stresses are built up
underneath the area of contact. The stresses increase with
increasing load and the material is deformed elastically. At the
contact surface irregularities deform and beneath the indenter a
zone of crushed rock is developed. This crushed zone behaves as a
plastic zone. The plastic zone distributes the applied load as
stresses to the surrounding rock, in all directions as the indenter
continues to penetrate the rock. Radial cracks are propagated
around the crushed zone as the applied load and stresses in the
plastic zone increase. When the load reaches a sufficient level, a
chip is formed and the stresses are released. The stored energy in
the chip is released as the chip moves out of the way. Each time a
chip is formed the load drops temporarily and must be built up to
a new, higher level to achieve chipping. The crushing and chipping
creates a crater (Abu Bakar, 2012).
34
 References
• Frenzel, C., “Wear Patterns and Prediction of Disc
Cutter Consumption for TunnelBoring Machines,”
Proceedings of the SME Annual Meeting, Denver, CO,
Preprint Number. 11-128, 2011.
• Küpferle J., A. Röttger, W. Theisen. Excavation tool
concepts for TBMs – Understanding the material-
dependent response to abrasive wearTunnelling and
Underground Space Technology 68 (2017) 22–31.