Evaluation of the wastes occurred during block-cutting in marble factories

Mining related operations in natural stone industry can be divided into two sections, one of them is natural stone mining and the other one is natural stone dimensioning plant, (NSD plant), operations. Marbles, travertines and andesite rocks have been common natural stones types economically mined in Turkey. When the waste, (unusable stone fragments, micronized rock dust etc.) in consideration, wastes can be created in natural stone mines and they can be occurred in NSD plant. In this thesis study, wastes generated at a NSD plant near Elazığ city (Turkey) have been perceived to evaluate waste occurrence cases. When two typically sized natural stone blocks from the same stone mines are started to be dimensioned in a NSD plant (by using the same cutting and dimensioning machines), total saleable natural stone plate surface areas (for the similar plates) obtained at the end of the operation can be different. It was aimed in this study to observe and understand governing (influencing) parameters of these differences. Actually, parameters influencing the waste amounts in NSD plants can be related with followings; cutting machine and its disk's performances, different marble plate dimensions required to be cut, marble plate thickness differences, micro discontinuities in marble blocks, irregularities in the marble blocks, problems related with workers, mechanical property differences of natural stones, marble dimensioning machine types and their properties. Detail evaluations of these parameters have searched to understand cause of the waste materials generated at NSD plants. Thus, mining operations in natural stone mines and NSD plants will be planned accordingly to minimize these wastes. This action will impact positively on Turkish natural stone industry as well. Particularly, wastes occurred during marble dimensioning in NSD plants have been aimed here to be determined. Appointments are given consequently to decrease wastes generated at NSD plants.