Charecteristics of Performance Monitering system for DTH drilling- Atlas Copco Edge

Today Atlas Copco is marketing drilling monitoring system under the name of “Atlas Copco Secoroc EDGE” in collaboration with SECOND SQUARE. This system relies on processed signals from measurement gauges. Effectiveness of the drilling operation as well as the equipment status can be observed by the drilling operator by interpreting the processed output signals. The purpose of this work is to investigate the signals and data obtained from the monitoring system EDGE and thus explain their relation to actual physics of drilling involved in the remote location. Based on the output signals and drilling scenario associated to that signal, a generalized relation between The Physics of Drilling and Output Vibration signals from EDGE is to be established. The aim is to provide information and alert (Visual/Auditory) to the driller about the possible critical scenario and performance of drilling, making the monitoring system more effective and simpler to use. Today drilling operation mainly relies on experience of the operators, experienced drillers pay attention to the sound and in general, base their judgement on their intuition. An efficient monitoring system will provide experienced drillers with additional senses as guidelines, to optimize the drilling process. It will also guide inexperienced drillers, in improving their drilling performance in quality and efficiency. It is an opportunity to examine the mode shapes involved in a transient system thus improving our understanding of the hammer-rock interaction in the process. During this thesis the concept of quantifying salient aspects of a complex system through FFTs were studied. An experiment was conducted to verify various theories and claims regarding the present monitoring system and also to see the patterns in other system variables like the different line pressures and R.P.M etc.