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Room-and-Pillar Underground Mine Cavern & Supporting Rock Pillar (H = 400 m)
Dolomite rock massif hosting 4 intersecting room drifts and a central supporting monolithic rock pillar (800 × 800 mm) under 42.1 MN overburden load.
Evaluate the load-bearing capacity and safety factor of the central rock pillar under 400 m of overlying rock strata, calculating tributary area load channeling and verifying pillar core integrity against crushing and rib spalling.
1. Geometry & FEA Mesh
- •3D solid rock block (2000 × 2000 × 1200 mm) with 4 intersecting room drifts leaving a square pillar (800 × 800 mm, height 400 mm)
- •Material: Dolomite / Limestone Ore Rock (E = 42.0 GPa, ν = 0.25, density 2680 kg/m³)
- •Mesh: 94,221 linear tetrahedral elements (TET4) with 19,561 nodes (58,683 DOFs)
- •Exact face grouping via unified journal: 4 vertical pillar ribs, room ceilings, room floors, overburden top, and symmetry confinement faces
2. Loads & Boundary Conditions
- •Vertical lithostatic overburden force Fz = -42.07 MN applied to the top face (H = 400 m depth)
- •Bottom boundary roller-supported (Uz = 0); lateral massif faces roller-supported (Ux = 0, Uy = 0)
- •Pillar vertical ribs and room boundaries are traction-free excavated surfaces
3. Simulation Results & Findings
- ✓Maximum vertical convergence |u| = 3.236 mm at the cavern ceiling directly above the pillar
- ✓Peak von Mises stress σ_vm = 201.4 MPa concentrated at the four sharp corners of the pillar
- ✓Tributary area theory confirmed: vertical stress in the pillar core reaches 3.2× the far-field lithostatic overburden; reaction residual is 0.00%
Crucial for mining geotechnical teams designing room-and-pillar extraction ratios in salt, potash, coal, and limestone mines to maximize ore recovery while eliminating catastrophic pillar collapse risks.
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