Impact of the Length of Manoeuvering Roads of a Bucket Wheel Excavator for Working Times in the Shortwall

The article presents one of the possibilities of using a bucket wheel excavator technology (with a daily capacity of over 100,000 m3) when removing an overburden on the stabilised front in the opencast lignite mine. The influence of excavator manoeuvring movements on the choice of parameters of operational floors is discussed. The assessment of the efficiency of the work process was made, among other things, while maintaining the required safety conditions and geometric parameters of the working front. It has been shown that in the bucket wheel excavator’s over-elevation work with variable variants of vertical and horizontal division (for a given floor height), the length of manoeuvring roads on the operational front is more favourable than the working technology of the entire height of the floor.