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Study on the bearing structure and stability of overlying strata: an interval gob in shallow buried coal mining of Northwest China

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Abstract

The bearing structural characteristics of overlying strata in overlying gobs are the main factor in inducing dynamic disasters in roof in close-distance coal seam group mining. In the present work, the bearing structure and stability characteristics of overlying strata in the shallow-buried interval gob (SBIG) of Yushenfu mining area in north Shaanxi Province, China, have been studied by numerical and physical similarity simulations and theoretical analyses. Research results showed that the instability of gob temporary coal pillars (TCP) led to the rotary instability of basic roof, increasing the stress arch in overlying strata with the expansion of the failure range of overlying rocks giving rise to increases of arch height and superimposition of adjacent stress arches. This way, “trapezoid-semicircular arch” caving of overlying strata was performed. “W-shaped voussoir beam” bearing structure was formed by the fracture of the basic roof of gob and “double arch bridge” bearing structure was created by interval coal pillar (ICP) and fracture rock. In this work, the bearing structure model of interval gob overlying rock “W-shaped voussoir beam + double arch bridge” was established. On the basis of “voussoir beam structure,” the stability of “double arch bridge” type bearing structure formed by the rotation of broken rock block on the top of the basic roof of the interval gob was analyzed. When the support capacity of coal pillar was weakened or the overlying strata were changed, the stability of asymmetrical stress inclined arch equilibrium structure was lost. The stress distribution of “double arch bridge” structure overlying the interval type gob was analyzed by numerical simulation, and the stress transfer law of pier column in floor was obtained. It was found that with the decrease of the width of pier pillar, the “double arch bridge” structure became asymmetric, and the change characteristics of stress inclined arch height were decreased. The arch roof transferring to pier side was divided into prevention and control areas of roof dynamic disaster in the mining of lower coal seams. The purpose of this paper was to provide theoretical guidance for dynamic pressure prevention and control of mining under shallow interval gob.

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Data availability

The data used to support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon request.

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Acknowledgments

We thank the National Natural Science Foundation of China for its support of this study. We thank academic editors and anonymous reviewers for their kind suggestions and valuable comments.

Funding

The National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No.51774229), the Innovation Capacity Support Program (Science and Technology Innovation Team) of Shaanxi Province (No.2018TD-038), the Natural Science Fundamental Research Program-Joint Fund Project of Shaanxi Province (2019JLM-41), and Open Fund Project of State Key Laboratory for Water Resources Protection and Utilization in Coal Mining (SHJT-17-42.3)

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Energy Engineering, Xi’an University of Science and Technology, Xi’an, 710054, Shaanxi, China

    Jie Zhang & Bin Wang

  2. Key Laboratory of Western Mine Exploitation and Hazard Prevention of Ministry of Education, Xi’an University of Science and Technology, Xi’an, 710054, Shaanxi, China

    Jie Zhang

Authors
  1. Jie Zhang
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  2. Bin Wang
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Contributions

Conceptualization: J.Z. and B. W.; data curation: B. W.; funding acquisition: J. Z.; project administration: J. Z.; validation: J. Z. and B.W.; writing of original draft: B. W.; writing of review and editing, J: Z. and B.W.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Bin Wang.

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The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

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Responsible Editor: Murat Karakus

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Zhang, J., Wang, B. Study on the bearing structure and stability of overlying strata: an interval gob in shallow buried coal mining of Northwest China. Arab J Geosci 14, 255 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12517-021-06479-8

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12517-021-06479-8

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