Department Dredging Technology   Dredging Technology

Professor: prof.ir. W.J. Vlasblom

Machinery for the treatment of soil and/or bulk goods are constituting an interface between Mechanical Engineering and Civil Engineering. Within this framework one must think of dredging machinery, tunnel drilling machines and equipment for the treatment of bulk goods. This field comprises excavation, transport and sedimentation processes of soil, rock and bulk goods that are brought about by human intervention and controlled by means of the appropriate machinery. The purpose in this is to realize or maintain "constructions" and to mine, transfer or treat building materials or ores.

Examples of the constructions mentioned above are: ports, channels, land reclamation, cores of dykes and (drilling) tunnels. Examples of the treatment of materials are: soil treatment, mixed heap systems and the separation of materials when mining minerals. Examples of transference are: the transshipment of bulk materials, conveyor belts in the mining industry and hydraulic transport of solids. An important development in this is the drilling of tunnels in "feeble" ground.

The designing of and working with the equipment mentioned above is primarily determined by physical processes, such as loosening up rock, soil or bulk materials, vertical and horizontal transport, positioning in the means of transport, treatment and positioning of the material in a desired geometry.

When designing machinery, a large number of restrictions play an important part. They all relate to local circumstances, such as the availability of facilities, the condition of the soil or bulk goods, the availability of resource-rich areas for the purpose of elevation, dumping sites for the removal of materials from digged-in constructions, wind and weather conditions, environmental requirements, available energy and a large number of other technical, administrative and economic restrictions. Furthermore, it is required to possess a profound insight into the availability of highly sophisticated mechanical constructions that often have to operate under heavy and dynamic load conditions due to the aggressive environment.

In the second half of the third year, an adequate course programme must be completed and a lab assignment or literary study must be carried out and laid down in a report. The first half of the fourth year starts out with the carrying out of a process study with respect to parts of problems in dredging technology, tunnelling and bulkhandling. As a rule, the cooperation with industry (users and/or builders of materials), consulting engineers or public authorities plays an important part in this. This study report usually supplies the conditions for a second mechanical engineering design assignment, closely connected to the first. In the final assignment, a 6-week engineering assignment, undergraduates are either to elaborate on a certain aspect of the preceding assignments or to judge the chosen design on its economic merits.

The assignments mentioned above may vary in nature. Either they consist in the carrying out of theoretical groundwork research or in the designing of constructions that are easy to handle in a practical sense. Supportive research in the laboratory or the development of mathematical models may be part of this study, in which the use of computers is standard practice.

This study is completed by means of an academic seminar and an engineer's exam before a mixed panel of examiners, including representatives of industry.