“CAPS: A Simulator of Shovel-Truck System in Open Pit Mines Using a Micro-Computer”

Abstract

The model presented here is meant to minimize management’s risk and supplying open pit miners with a scientific tool which aids in decision making. We have tried to use the advantages offered by micro-computers and especially the interactive dialogue programation and the visualization of results. A model called CAPS (in french: CAmions-Pelle Système) simulates a shovel-truck system. The program, written for Apple II 48 K, is compiled by the package TASC to reduce the calculation time which does not exceed 30 seconds for 10 trucks assigned to a given shovel. CAPS works in connection with two other programs which are MENU and CALCUL. The first prepares all data files necessary for the simulation, while the second calculates, using this information, truck travel time. Three fundamental differences distinguish CAPS from previous simulators. First, the decision is still made by the user and not the computer; this is possible due to the interactive dialogue programation. The second is that previous simulators usually describe the empirical distribution of loading and dumping times by a standard probability distribution. Although this frees a sizeable block of computer storage the user, and especially the miner, is obliged to sample many observations and to have a certain knowledge of statistics to apply a fitness test.