Mintec’s global seminar series begins this spring when MineQuest returns to the Westward Look Resort in Tucson, April 14-18. Workshops, presentations, and one-on-one consultation are the hallmarks of MineQuest’s collaborative learning experience, now in its fourth decade.
This year we invite you to broaden your mind and your mine by learning more about MineSight. With so much MineSight innovation in the past year, there’s so much more to learn! MineSight Atlas, our resource-based, true calendar approach to multiple-activity scheduling, is reshaping short-term planning. Mining Magazine readers have already voted Atlas the best mine planning software in the industry.
Thanks to its integration with MineSight Atlas, the enhanced MineSight Schedule Optimizer is now an essential and integrated planning tool for clients needing a standardized approach to scheduling. Clients will learn how they can move ever closer to true integrated planning – one package for short-term, medium-term, and long-term planning.
Also creating a buzz is the MineSight Implicit Modeler, a mathematical tool enabling geologists to build complex shapes directly from drillholes. Since its release last year, the MineSight Implicit Modeler has developed quickly. Learn how future versions of Implicit Modeler will feature block models as input/output; integration with true thickness calculation logic for seam modeling; and a complex geological model builder for an automatable and auditable model build process.
New on the market is MineSight Performance Manager, which is addressing the critical issue of reporting a mine’s vital information through powerful analytics. With spreadsheets eliminated and a common data warehouse, Performance Manager ensures that data transfer up to other systems (such as SAP) is seamless.
MineSight Performance Manager is already helping clients to see the dollars in the details.
Underground miners will learn first-hand about a host of new MineSight underground tools. MineSight Stope, Sub-Blocking, Room and Pillar and the Decline Design tool are among the underground products to be featured at MineQuest 2014.
In keeping with our learning theme, the University of MineSight will be on display with a presentation and more information about Mintec’s newest training initiative.
Jesse Aarsen of Moose Mountain Technical Services presents at MineQuest 2013.
There will be numerous opportunities for networking during a week under the Arizona sun. As always, MineQuest events are free to attend as part of your maintenance package. Client presenters interested in sharing their knowledge of MineSight in the field should email fred.fest@mintec.com.
We look forward to seeing you at MineQuest-Tucson, or at any of these MineQuest events.
April 14-18 MineQuest Tucson
June 19-20 MineQuest Perth
June 24-25 MineQuest Swakopmund
Nov. 6-7 MineQuest Hermosillo
Nov. 10-11 MineQuest Lima
Nov. 13-14 MineQuest Santiago
Register here.
Here’s a preview of our MineQuest workshops and presentations.
WORKSHOPS
New for MineSight 3D
By Jose Sanchez
Mintec continually strives to bring you the latest technology and functionality through our software. This workshop will highlight the changes to MineSight 3D Version 9.0. We will cover the new interface and display, including new features and grid set functionality, the new Relative Surface Interpolator, and many more enhancements. After completing this workshop, MS3D users can expect a greater understanding of the latest tools and enhancements.
Explore the world of Atlas for open pit
By Ryan Bloomfield
MineSight Atlas is a resource-based, multiple-activity scheduling product that uses a true calendar approach to mine scheduling. It combines resource assignment and Gantt chart scheduling into an easy-to-use tool that is seamlessly integrated with MineSight 3D, MineSight Reserve, and MineSight Haulage. MineSight Atlas features the ability to route material through a series of destinations, represented by actual geometry, and manages reclaim throughout the network. Atlas also uses a powerful animation engine to visualize and validate both the project schedule and destination filling sequences.
This workshop will cover the general interface and typical workflow of short and mid-range scheduling with Atlas in open pit environments, as well as introduce several new enhancements made since the initial release.
Elegant and intuitive is how Mintec describes MineSight Atlas, a product intended to reshape the world of short-term planning.
Better grade models with Implicit Modeler and Unfolding
By Alyson Cartwright
As the industry continues to explore and mine more complex deposits, MineSight tools grow to accommodate that complexity. This workshop will walk through a case study applying our latest technology to capture and model folded and deformed deposits effectively. Moving from raw drillhole data to a fully interpolated model, the focus will be on the MineSight Implicit Modeler and Unfolding toolset. These two products combined allow for both rapid solid and surface building, followed by interpolation representative of grade trends in a fold. We will examine the use of these tools within the standard MineSight software suite, emphasize new functionality in the Implicit Modeler and take a look at interpolation and variography with our latest unfolding tools. This workshop will be workflow based, with a start-to-finish approach to complex geology modeling.
MineSight Reserve: The power of specialized reserve tools
By Elif Acikalin
MineSight Reserve continues to serve as a potent tool to report reserves with the combined functionality of specialized reserves engines in a user-friendly interface. This workshop will demonstrate examples of MineSight Reserve setup similar to legacy reserve reporting procedures. The highlights of this workshop will be on the latest developments in MineSight Reserve and its applications in Gridded Seam Models, as well as the recent enhancements in selective mining options.
New light underground with Stope and Atlas
By Jeb Curtis
Clients attending this workshop will see the workflow for integrating MineSight Stope with MineSight Atlas. The workflow will be a semi-technical, high-end overview of how to develop a stope model, stope geometries, stope schedules, and incorporate underground workings into a MineSight Atlas plan to execute the mining sequence defined by MineSight Stope. The class will be structured to provide a general understanding of underground resources and scheduling techniques for MineSight Atlas.
MineSight Performance Manager: See the dollars in the details
By Mary James
Technological advances have led to a deluge of data being available for monitoring mine operations. Some of these advancements include the monitoring of equipment health, automated rock fragmentation analysis, fleet management position monitoring using GPS, and digital geologic data mapped in the field with tablet PC’s. The information can be tracked using systems set up around the pit, multiple systems and sensors located on the equipment fleet, and from desktop applications. However, this takes time and training. It can be difficult to organize an enormous library of information so it can be used to generate meaningful metrics about the mining process. MineSight Performance Manager is an exciting opportunity for mine managers to exploit key metrics and make data driven decisions for the mining process.
This workshop will demonstrate how MineSight Performance Manager (MSPM) centralizes and stores information from multiple systems. MSPM features consolidated reporting and true mining analytics. It quickly answers the ‘what’ and the ‘why’ of mine production via dashboards that offer streamlined displays for intelligent decisions. With a window on operational costs and production goals, it saves time and money.
True Integration with MineSight Schedule Optimizer
By Ernesto Vivas
Mine plans are typically prepared with different tools for long, medium and short term planning. However, the translation of data from one platform to another one, presents challenges. Each one has different assumptions and levels of details. MineSight Schedule Optimizer (MSSO) helps close this gap. MSSO is a mine planning tool which can be used for long, medium and short range planning.
Recent improvements to MSSO include the ability to schedule partial cuts, equipment/haulage integration, multi-period optimization and scheduling, etc. These developments among others enable MSSO to be used for long term planning as well as for short term planning.
The benefits of using the same tool for long, medium and short range schedules are clear. The integrity of the data is kept under a single database, which means less time spent on validation of data and import/export data formats. MSSO allows you to redefine plans and add extra levels of detail within a single interface. The results can be quickly visualized in MineSight 3D and mining rules can be added dynamically for user control. Also, the software training required for mine engineers to transition from short to medium or long range planning is minimal. The information gathered from the long range plans is transmitted seamlessly to the medium and short range engineers. Similarly, the information gathered from the medium and short range plans is retrofitted into the long term plans to make them more representative. The end result is a mine plan comprising long, medium and short term planning strategies that are integrated and perfectly aligned.
This workshop will present additional details with case study applications. Examples of long term plans prepared with MSSO will be compared and validated with MineSight Strategic Planner. Similarly, examples of medium/short term plans prepared with MSSO will be compared and refined with MineSight Interactive Planner. This workshop will showcase MSSO’s ability to connect long, medium and short range planning strategies in order to produce an integrated mine plan.
This workshop is an extension of the presentation, “True Integration: Schedule Optimizer Closing the Planning Gap”.
Plotting for productivity
By Adam Elick
The plot layout editor has been completely reworked and updated with the release of MineSight 3D 8.5. The tool is much easier to use and gives you explicit varying levels of control. The workshop will cover the new interface and its various improvements, as well as a quick live demo of several plotting scenarios. If you do any sort of plotting, plan on attending this workshop.
MineSight Tips and Tricks
By Verne Vice
This workshop will provide you with some tips and tricks to refine and improve your workflow within MineSight 3D. Expect a live demonstration with new topics about every five minutes. Topics will include the following: designing clipped polygon cuts outside of scheduling packages; an easy guide to using the Element Rotate tool; navigating and using the new Model menu; surface Boolean operations from the viewer; customizing viewers and cursors to assist with CAD work; and building custom non-orthogonal grid sets.
Introducing MineSight Planner
By Kris Smith
MineSight Planner is an interactive material reporting and scheduling tool used by professionals to create, evaluate, implement and report mining schedules. Using output and/or logic from existing MineSight tools, such as MineSight Reserve, MineSight Interactive Planner, MineSight Interactive Planner-Material Manager, and MineSight Atlas, you are able to easily create a practical mining schedule and report it using Advanced Reporting and Charting (ARC). This workshop will demonstrate how to create mining schedules using MineSight Planner that honor mining and processing constraints and how to view schedule results using MineSight 3D and ARC.
Sub-block vs. Multi-ore Percent: A Case Study
By Aaron Amoroso
For years modelers have used Multi-ore Percent (MOP) models when trying to understand and model complex deposits. MOP models are extremely accurate but lose precision in the exact location of model blocks, which can hinder their ability with non-bulk mining. MineSight’s latest modeling approach, Sub-Blocking, now offers modelers a modeling approach that yields higher material precision by providing a more accurate representation of the modeled ore body. The benefits can include visualization and planning with selective mining. But how do these two different modeling methods really differ when compared to each other? Are there deliverable differences? This presentation will highlight a project involving the two different modeling techniques. We will perform a comparative investigation to better understand modeling sensitivities from a practical perspective.
More power to your modeling: MineSight Sub-Blocking workflow
By Donald Hernandez
MineSight’s new sub-blocking functionality allows for greater precision during any engineering or geological task involving a 3D block model. This feature yields greater resolution between geologic contacts (i.e. lithological, geochemical, grade shells, etc.) and enables the tracking of different material types on a block by block basis; all this, results in more accurate resource, reserve, and dilution calculations. This talk will cover a typical, multitasked, workflow to show practical use of the sub-blocking function. We will cover grade shell creation using the MineSight Implicit Modeler, model coding, creation of report statistics (MineSight Data Analyst), reserve calculation using MineSight Reserve, reblocking using MSDART, and pit shell creation using MineSight Economic Planner. Clients will gain a greater understanding of how sub-blocking can be used in daily routines for increased precision in their results.
Introduction to variogram Calculations and Modeling
By Loren Hill
MineSight Data Analyst (MSDA) features a suite of statistical and geostatistical programs that will assist you in determining and analyzing spatial relationships. This workshop provides an introduction to MSDA’s applications to variogram modeling in MineSight projects with emphasis on normal variograms, downhole variograms and the Variogram 3D Manager. The discussion will also incorporate variogram calculations and practical applications.
MineSight Torque for Economic Compositing
By Richard Moffett
Economic compositing comprises a group of sample intervals being selected to satisfy a minimum mining width while attempting to select those assay intervals for a desired cut-off grade. MineSight Torque’s compositing routine offers two modes; uncontrolled, where the routine simply finds these composites in the drillhole data; or a controlled mode where you add a zone code to the drillhole intervals to guide the operation of the routine. This workshop will show how to set up these operating modes, while illustrating what to do with the resulting composite information.
Closing the planning gap: Schedule Optimizer | Atlas | Axis
By Erman Koc
MineSight Schedule Optimizer, Atlas, Axis, and Performance Manager change the mine planning world by introducing one streamlined workflow. A fully integrated mine planning system will bring incredible benefits to all sites for monitoring costs, personnel and equipment. In this workshop, we will see a case study of this workflow.
Evaluating an infill drilling campaign using geostatistics
By Alexis Eapen
During the development of open pit mining projects, additional geologic information is collected in the form of infill campaigns. The goal of an infill campaign is to maximize the profit of the mining project by reducing the negative effect of prediction error of the estimated block model in the mine plan. However, in practice, the design of an infill campaign considers a wide range of parameters and situations that is difficult to formulate as an optimization problem. A simplistic formulation of the problem may result in an unrealistic infill campaign design.
This paper describes the implementation of a methodology, based on the concept of value-of-information (VOI), to assess the profit contribution of infill campaign designs. The profit contribution of the infill campaign is calculated as the difference of two components: 1) revenue contribution and 2) cost of drilling. The revenue contribution is positive as the additional infill information improves the accuracy of the estimated block model, thus, reducing the prediction error related costs. The cost of drilling consists of all the costs incurred since the extraction of the infill samples up to the processing of the infill information. It is this component that reduces the effect of the revenue contribution. The application of this methodology is to be used in the selection of the most cost effective infill campaign design among a set of alternatives.
To illustrate the implementation of the methodology, a case study that consists of evaluating five infill campaign designs is discussed. The infill campaign design that yields the largest profit contribution is proposed for implementation.
Productive coal mining with MineSight Reserve
By Melanie Bolduc
The numerous advantages of MineSight Reserve are now available for complex coal! This workshop will take a detailed look at the complex coal functionalities within MineSight Reserve. We will offer a comprehensive review of the reporting logic applicable to a complex coal deposit. The importance of understanding the difference between a ‘multiple ore percent’ block model versus a ‘multiple material percent’ block model will be highlighted and the implications in the MineSight Reserve setup will be demonstrated. The session will show examples of applications of the MineSight Reserve Calculated Fields and establish a parallel between the legacy coal reporting procedure (cmpres.dat), the MineSight Interactive Planner setup and MineSight Reserve.
Implicit Modeler: A better way to model coal
By Melanie Bolduc
Improvements to the MineSight Implicit Modeler will have huge implications for complex coal modeling. True thickness calculations with surface outputs are the latest additions to the product. In this workshop, see the innovation in action with a full demo of the new true thickness capability from a seam footwall surface to the seam hanging wall surface. This session will highlight the new multiple ore percent support in MineSight Data Analyst as well as enhancements in MineSight Torque that improve complex coal modeling. We welcome a group discussion on integrating the new applications and tools with your complex coal modeling workflow.
Long term planning with Schedule Optimizer
By Adam Elick
Most clients know that MineSight Schedule Optimizer (MSSO) is the tool of choice for short and medium term mine planning, but it can also be used for long term planning. Recent updates and added features enable MSSO to do almost everything our traditional long term planning tool MineSight Strategic Planner (MSSP) does. The difference is that MSSO is much easier to learn, set up, and use! Did we mention it offers multi-period, infallible scheduling, and links with MineSight Haulage? Anyone who does long term planning, especially MSSP users, should attend this workshop.
PRESENTATIONS
On a roll: Implicit Modeler gains momentum
By Mark Gabbitus
It has only been a year since we released the MineSight Implicit Modeler (MSIM) yet there has been a massive amount of development and improvements since then. The addition of directional control was a key requirement discussed at the last MineQuest by all who saw MSIM but the developments go further than that. Adding the ability to model point clouds takes Implicit Modeler into the engineering space and the much anticipated ability to generate seam surfaces using true thickness calculations will definitely be a hit with coal modelers. This presentation will highlight the developments made in the last year and outline our vision for the future.
Performance Manager meets the big data challenge
By Mark Gabbitus
All mining companies want to save money and/or make more money from their resources. The challenge is designing, monitoring and managing business improvement processes to help achieve this goal. This is particularly true for blast fragmentation analysis where huge savings and improvements can be made if you can just make sense of all the data. The MineSight Performance Manager is designed to collate, analyse and present the large amounts of data that are now collected in an attractive interface. This presentation will outline the challenge of big data in mining and why using Performance Manager will save you money.
New for MineSight Torque
By Jose Sanchez
With the focus on hosting and managing drillhole data in a secure environment, MineSight Torque employs a broad range of easy-to-use tools in a streamlined, user-friendly environment. This presentation will showcase some of the new features in MineSight Torque 3.1 and 3.2 from auto compositing (rule-based compositing) to an acQuire importer. We will also look at the new functionality for point samples, as well as the addition of QA/QC functions.
True Integration: Schedule Optimizer Closing the Planning Gap
By Ernesto Vivas
Mine plans are typically prepared with different tools for long, medium and short term planning. However, the translation of data from one platform to another one, presents challenges. Each one has different assumptions and levels of details. MineSight Schedule Optimizer (MSSO) helps close this gap. MSSO is a mine planning tool which can be used for long, medium and short range planning.
Recent improvements to MSSO include the ability to schedule partial cuts, equipment/haulage integration, multi-period optimization and scheduling, etc. These developments among others enable MSSO to be used for long term planning as well as for short term planning.
The benefits of using the same tool for long, medium and short range schedules are clear. The integrity of the data is kept under a single database, which means less time spent on validation of data and import/export data formats. MSSO allows you to redefine plans and add extra levels of detail within a single interface. The results can be quickly visualized in MineSight 3D and mining rules can be added dynamically for user control. Also, the software training required for mine engineers to transition from short to medium or long range planning is minimal. The information gathered from the long range plans is transmitted seamlessly to the medium and short range engineers. Similarly, the information gathered from the medium and short range plans is retrofitted into the long term plans to make them more representative. The end result is a mine plan comprising long, medium and short term planning strategies that are integrated and perfectly aligned.
From Interactive Planner to MineSight Planner
By Ryan Bloomfield
MineSight Planner is an interactive material reporting and scheduling tool used by professionals to create, evaluate, implement and report mining schedules. Using output and/or logic from existing MineSight tools, such as MineSight Reserve, MineSight Interactive Planner, MineSight Interactive Planner – Material Manager, and MineSight Atlas, you’re able to easily create a practical mining schedule and report it using Advanced Reporting and Charting (ARC). This 25-minute presentation will give you a high-level overview of features and functionality compared to the current MineSight Interactive Planner. Attend the ‘Introducing MineSight Planner’ workshop for more details.
Modeling: A true unfolding story
By Alyson Cartwright
Complex geology requires innovative approaches. MineSight’s unfolding solution allows for better grade estimation when dealing with folding and deformation. With simple inputs and straightforward auditing tools, modelers can better represent grade distribution with confidence. The relative surface interpolator (RSI) allows for the creation of dilution shells and intermediate surfaces, while the full unfolding solution carries through variography and interpolation.
More power to your modeling: MineSight Sub-Blocking Workflow
By Will Cain
MineSight’s sub-blocking functionality has grown in the last year. With this feature’s continuing maturation, more emphasis has been placed on exploring the possibilities now accessible to both engineers and geologists. This presentation will look deeper into the advantages provided by MineSight Sub-Blocking.
Brighter underground: Stope and new design tools
By Jim Lonergan
This presentation will describe the latest MineSight tools and programs related to underground mining. MineSight 3D underground design tools feature several new additions, including the Decline Design tool, the Raise Design tool and a tool to facilitate Room and Pillar design. A conceptual level stope definition and scheduling program, MineSight Stope, has been added to the MineSight underground mining repertoire. These tools can all be found under the UG Eng Tools tab on the MineSight 3D menu. This presentation will feature an overview of these tools. For more detailed demonstrations of the tools, be sure to attend our related workshop, ‘New light underground with Stope and Atlas’.
Plenty in Reserve: The new features of MineSight Reserve
By Erik Johnson
This talk will share some of MineSight Reserve’s recent enhancements. Stratigraphic model support has been added and we have greatly expanded the ability to do selective mining. We’ve added partials mapping along with ‘Mineto’ ability. This allows you to control the order in which material is taken from blocks, as well as allowing subsequent cuts to consider what has already been taken in multiple ore percent cases. The ability to consider footwall surfaces has also been added. MineSight Reserve integrates seamlessly with other MineSight tools so products such as MineSight Atlas and MineSight Planner, which leverage MineSight Reserve as their engine, will also benefit from these features.
University of MineSight: Broaden your mind and your mine
By Robert Walker
Meet Robert Walker, Mintec’s senior services coordinator, and learn more about the University of MineSight, our renewed commitment to training and services in 2014. This short presentation will focus on how MineSight services and the University of MineSight will help clients become more effective and efficient in all aspects of their mining process. Learn how to get the most from Rob and his team.
MineSight Experience Room
By Robert Walker
Experience the rewards gained by others using Mintec services by taking a guided tour through the MineSight Experience Room. More importantly, learn how Mintec’s services team can help you beyond just technical support and training. Mintec services, such as Project Assist, have been enhanced and might just offer the expertly executed, cost effective solution you’ve been looking for.
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