Unmanned driving technology has always been one focus of mine smart transportation, which is a crucial component of smart mines. However, the descriptions of both the intelligent transportation system and its industrial application are not comprehensive. In order to have an all-encompassing and comprehensive understanding of both the intelligent coal mine transportation system and its industrial application with the intelligent system, this paper summarizes and analyzes the current research status of unmanned driving technology in mines and the industrial application of current mining transportation vehicles. It begins by outlining the current research state of unmanned driving technology in mines and then assesses the advancement of unmanned driving technology. The unmanned transportation system in mines is also introduced, together with its components for perception, location, path planning, vehicle control, and multi-vehicle scheduling. In addition, each component is described in combination with the current artificial intelligent unmanned technology individually. Then, some typical categories of intelligent industrial vehicles are introduced for learning about the conditions of their actual application. There are almost four hundred coal mines that have researched unmanned driving technology, and some companies have applied the unmanned technology to realize transportation with an efficiency enhancement of 70~80%. Finally, currently existing challenges and future research are analyzed and proposed. This review may provide more comprehensive knowledge of the intelligent coal mine, accelerating the development of intelligent technology and helping to build a new management and control model.

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to describe some tribological experiments which were executed to find the influence of braking pressure on tribological performance of non‐asbestos brake shoe used in mine hoister during its emergency braking.Design/methodology/approach: The WSM‐3 non‐asbestos brake shoe, which has been widely used in mine hoister, was selected as experimental material. Some tribological experiments of the brake shoe sliding on 16Mn steel were investigated on the X‐DM friction tester by simulating of emergency braking conditions of mine hoister. Three kinds of tribological indexes: friction coefficient, stability coefficient of friction coefficient, and wear rate were considered to score the tribological performance and the morphology of worn surfaces were observed through the S‐3000N scanning electron microscopy (SEM) to explore the tribological mechanisms.Findings: It was found first, that the instant friction coefficient is not constant during emergency braking. After a short climbing period, it rises gradually to steady value. Second, with the increasing of braking pressure, the mean friction coefficient rises first then falls, while its stability coefficient falls gradually. The wear rate rises continuously with the braking pressure increasing. Also, the rising velocity of wear rate at high pressure is higher than it is at low pressure. Third, the instant surface temperature rises first then falls during braking and the mean surface temperature rises continuously with the braking pressure increasing.Originality/value: It is found that the increasing of braking pressure within a certain range is helpful for achieving a high friction coefficient and a steady wear rate. But too high pressure will cause contrarily the falling of frictional performance and serious of wear performance. So it is not reliable to rise the braking pressure without limited during emergency braking.

Purpose: In order to improve the braking safety of mine hoisters, this paper aims to focus on the continuous repetitious emergency braking conditions to investigate an abnormal frictional phenomena called “Frictional catastrophe (FC)” and its mechanisms.Design/methodology/approach: The non‐asbestos brake shoe of a mine hoister was selected as frictional material and its paring material is 16Mn steel. The tribological properties of the brake shoe were tested on the pad‐on‐disc friction tester by the simulation of continuous emergency braking conditions. The thermal analysis experiments, the temperature field simulations and the SEM analysis of the brake shoe were accomplished to reveal the mechanisms of the FC.Findings: It was found that the friction coefficient of the brake shoe sometimes falls suddenly during braking. This abnormal frictional phenomena is called “Frictional catastrophe (FC)”. It is considered that the friction heat, which is accumulated rapidly by the braking on the surface of the brake shoe, makes the surface layer material qualitatively change from the solid state to a mixed state composed of gases, liquids and solid. The frictional modality of the braking changes accordingly from dry friction to lubrication with gases and liquids. The sudden lubrication makes the friction coefficient fall suddenly and induces the FC phenomena.Originality/value: An abnormal tribological phenomena called “Frictional catastrophe (FC)” was found in this paper. The investigations about the behaviors and mechanisms of the FC are considered helpful for improving the braking safety of mine hoisters and other machines.

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to find the influence of the initial braking velocity and braking frequency on the tribological performance of the non-asbestos brake shoe used in mine hoisters during some continuous emergency brakings. Design/methodology/approach – The tribological performance experiments of the WSM-3 non-asbestos brake shoe braking on the 16 Mn steel are investigated on the X-DM friction tester, by simulating continuous emergency brakings of a mine hoister ten times. Three kinds of tribological indexes: friction coefficient, its stability coefficient, and wearing rate are considered to score the tribological performance of the brake shoe. Findings – When the initial braking velocity increases, the mean friction coefficient of the brake shoe decreases at first, then rises, and falls again finally. But when the braking frequency exceeds seven times, the falling process of the friction coefficient at low-velocity period does not appear again. Second, when the initial braking velocity is no higher than 10?m/s, the mean friction coefficient rises with the braking frequency increasing. But when the velocity exceeds 10?m/s, the mean friction coefficient rises with the braking frequency increasing at first, then falls. Third, when the initial braking velocity is no higher than 12.5?m/s, the friction coefficient of the brake shoe has quite a favorable stability with the coefficient is no bigger than 75 percent. But when the velocity exceeds 12.5?m/s, the stability of the friction coefficient is diminishing obviously. Fourth, the wearing rate of the brake shoe increases quickly, during the process that the velocity rising from 10 to 12.5?m/s, but increases much more slowly after that period. Originality/value – The paper investigates the tribological performance of the WSM-3 non-asbestos brake shoe during some continuous emergency brakings and finds that, when the initial braking velocity is no higher than 12.5?m/s and the braking frequency is no more than seven times, the WSM-3 non-asbestos brake shoe has quite a high friction coefficient, a good friction stability, and a low-wearing rate, which indicate that it is very appropriate for using in the disk brake of mine hoisters in China.

Elbow wear is a major threat to the multiphase pipeline transportation industry, which has a negative impact on the stable operation of the transportation system. In order to find the wear reduction methods of elbows in the fluidization pipeline transportation system for 2000-meter-deep coal resources, the swirler was installed upstream of the elbows, and wear simulations and tests of three kinds of elbows were carried out. The results showed that the maximum wear rate (MWR) of elbows increased and then decreased along the elbow angle. Due to the different directions of gravity, the heavy wear position (HWP) of the horizontal-vertical (H-V) elbow was in front of the vertical-horizontal (V-H) elbow. Because the downstream portion of the horizontal-horizontal (H-H) elbow was still a horizontal pipe, the HWP of the H-H elbow almost covered the whole elbow. The swirler placed upstream of the elbows could make the particles at the elbow move to the intrados of the elbows, resulting in less collision between the particles and the extrados of the elbows, thus reducing the wear of the elbows. The wear reduction effects of swirlers on three different elbows were favorably connected with the guide vane angle (GVA) and negatively correlated with the guide vane length (GVL), decreased first and then increased as the guide vane height (GVH) increased, and were little affected by the guide vane number (GVN) and the guide vane thickness (GVT). The mathematical models between the MWR of the elbows and guide vane parameters were established. By bench tests, the wear reduction effect of three kinds of elbows under the optimal guide vane parameters was 58.4%, 76.9%, and 78.6%, respectively. The errors between the bench test results and the simulation results were around 10%.