INSTRUMENTS AND

AIR MEASUREMENTS
CHAPTER-6

1
Assignment 6
•Give a brief description of
chapter 6 the Instruments and
measurements

2
Mid term exam.
Mine safety & ventilation lab
• Course:
• Chapter 6
• All practicals conducted.

• Date of exam:
• 15-5-12

3
INTRODUCTION
• Ventilation system of operating mine must
• Satisfy the needs of underground personnel.
• Meet the standards and regulations.
• To ensure an effective, efficient and economical mine ventilation system,
• Reliable data must be obtained on the various properties of air.
• Such data forms the bases for analysis.

4
INTRODUCTION
• The most important properties for quantity control are:
• Air velocity
• Air pressure
• When these properties are known at various strategic points in the
mine then ---
• The overall quantity-control problem can be resolved by utilizing analytical
and /or numerical methods of fluid flow.

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INTRODUCTION
• Other properties helpful for quantity control are
• Temperature
• Density
• These properties have importance in temperature and humidity control.

6
Ventilation Survey
• Purpose:
1. To provide knowledge of the extent and tendency of the existent
ventilation system in meeting specific needs, standards, and
regulations.
2. To provide information for use in event of emergency or disaster
underground, such as fire, explosion, major ground cave-in, etc.
3. To plan for the improvement of present environmental conditions or
the efficiency of the present ventilation system.
4. To make provision for mining extension or modification, new fan
installation, changes in airways or circuits, etc

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TEMPERATURE
• Temperature both dry bulb(td)and wet bulb(tw) can be carried out
simultaneously by sling psychrometer.
• Stationary hygrometers are occasionally used in mine ventilation at main
fan installations.
• For routine underground measurements, the psychrometer is universally
used.

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Sling Psychrometer
• It consists of two thermometers mounted side by side on a
rigid frame.
• Thermometers are of 10 inch standard size.
• Graduated from 0 to 120 F o.
• Wet bulb has a wick of silk on muslin net encasing the
mercury bulb.
• Mounting frame is attached by a swivel connection to a
handle.
• The entire assembly can be rotated by applying a simple wrist
action to a handle.

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Sling Psychrometer
• Before operation the wick of the wet bulb is immersed in
water.
• Distilled water or any clean water is satisfactory.
• The psychrometer is rotated 2 to 3 revolution per second.
• It should be held at arms length upstream of the operator.
• Ventilation ducts:
• The instrument is inserted through an opening in the duct
and holding stationary( for having no sufficient room for
whirling)
• The thermometers are read after 2 min, wet bulb first.

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Sling Psychometer
• Several observations should be taken until consecutive
readings become constant.
• Principle:
• Dry-bulb thermometer reading is a measure of sensible heat
of the atmosphere.
• Wet-bulb thermometer measures the evaporative rate of the
air.
• Evaporation from the wet bulb thermometer is proportional
to the vapor pressure of the moisture in the ambient air.

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Sling Psychrometer
• For example:
• If the air contains little moisture, its vapor pressure is low, and
evaporation from the wet bulb takes rapidly.
• This removes heat from the bulb and temperature drops .
• Whirling removes the layer of saturated air which would soon
surround if the bulb were still.
• Use :
• These readings are used to determine
• Air density, and
• Temperature-humidity—control calculations.

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Rock Temperature
• Rock temperature is taken by maximum –reading
thermometer.
• Thermometer is placed in a drill hole.
• This type of thermometer either
• has a constriction in the glass column which retains the mercury
column at the point of highest rise or
• A float which remains at the maximum readings.
• Errors may be due to
• Heating effects due to drilling or
• Cooling effects due to circulating fluids.
• To avoid such errors readings are not taken for a period of 8 hours
after completion of the hole.

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14
Atmospheric Pressure
• Barometric or atmospheric pressure is measured by
barometer of either mercury or aneroid type.
• Mercury barometer and its operation are well know.
• Aneroid Barometer:
• It consists of a vacuum chamber or diaphragm capsule.
• One end of the capsule is fastened to a base plate.
• Air pressure tending to collapse the capsule is resisted by a
spring fastened to the opposite side of the capsule.
• The amount of distortion of the capsule is a measure of the
atmospheric pressure.

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Atmospheric Pressure
• It is transmitted to a needle on the dial by an arrangement of
levers and a chain and a sprocket.
• Temperature change is compensated by using a bimetallic bar
for one lever.
• Readings can be mad to 0.01 in of mercury.
• Precision Aneroid:
• Make use of the zero gagging method.
• The capsule is prevented from distortion by changing the
tension in the spring attached to one side.
• The tension is transmitted to a pointer on the dial of the
instrument, which is read after the capsule pointer is set at
zero.
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Atmospheric Pressure
• Altimeter:
• Precision aneroid readings in ft (graduated in 1-to- 10 ft
divisions) are known as Altimeters.
• Used in ventilation surveys underground for determining
static pressure differences.

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Air density
• Density is determined from
• Calculations or
• Charts from temperature and pressure.
• The Td, Tw and Pb of the air must be measured to determine density
(ω).
• Basic psychometric formulas may be used.
• One such formula is
1.325
• ω= (𝑃𝑏 − 0.378 𝑃’𝑣) -------- 6.1
𝑇𝑑

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Air density
• Where 𝑇𝑑 is absolute dry- bulb temperature in degrees.
• 𝑃𝑏 is atmospheric pressure press in inches of mercury.
• P’𝑣 is vapor pressure at dew point in inches of mercury.
• This formula is not convenient for rapid determination of ω.
• A graphical solution devised by McElroy shown on page 107,FIG. 6-1.
• This graph is sufficient accurate and recommended for all routine
calculations.

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Air velocity
• Velocity of air is determined to calculate quantity if airflow.
• Several instrument and techniques are in use to for measuring air
velocity.
• knowledge of their applications and limitation is desirable.
• For convenience velocity ranges are
• Low—less than 100 fpm
• Intermediate ---100 to 750 fpm
• High -- over 750 fpm

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Instruments for measuring velocity in mines

Instruments Velocity range, Sensitivity, Accuracy Features

fpm fpm
Smoke tube 20-120 (low) 5-10 70-90% Simple, compact, safe, indirect,
approximate
Vane - 150-2000 (inter 10-50 80-90 Simple, safe, compact,
anemometer mediate to high)
Velometer 30-300 low to 5-10 3% of Compact, rapid, safe,
high upper
scale
reading
Kata- 100-1500 10-25 70-90 Simple, safe, delicate
thermometer ( intermediate to
high)
Pitot tube 750-10000 10-25 90-98 Simple, safe, slow, indirect

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Air velocity
• Smoke tube:
• Smoke method is used to determine
• The presence of moving air
• Approximate velocity of flow
• It is used in metal mines only
• The device consists of
• Aspirator bulb—discharging air through a glass tube.
• The glass tube contains a smoke generating agent.
• Pumice stone saturated with anhydrous tin is used as smoke agent.

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Air velocity
• Principle:
• When the bulb is squeezed---
• Dense cloud of smoke is released.
• The smoke travels with air.
• The approximate air velocity is determined by timing how long the
cloud takes between tow points.
• This velocity is usually measured at the center of airway.
• A correction of 0.8 is applied to determine the average velocity.

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Air velocity
Vane Anemometer
• Vane anemometer is a small windmill.
• It is geared to a recording mechanism though a clutch.
• The pointer directly records air in feet of air flow.
• If reading are taken for one minute, then air velocity in fpm s
obtained.
• Zero gaging device is also provided.
• Used for intermediate and high range air velocity.
• i.e. 2000-10,000 fpm

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Air velocity--
Velometer
• Mostly used in industrial survey.
• It can also be used in underground mining.
• Air enters a port.
• Deflects vane of the instrument.
• The deflection is directly proportional to the velocity head.
• The velocity head is registered by the pointer.
• The velometr is a versatile instrument.
• It may be supplied with multiple scales.
• Thus it permits accurate measurement of velocities in all
ranges.

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Air velocity--
Thermo-anemometer
• Measures velocity by the rate at which heat is removed from
the heated object.
• It consists of two thermometer.
• One with an electric heating element.
• The heated bulb cools with air stream.
• The difference in temperature in the two bulb is converted to
air velocity by a conversion chart.

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Air velocity--
Hot-wire anemometer
• It consists of a probe mounting a platinum wire at one end.
• The wire is heated by the battery with in the instrument.
• The amount of heated dissipated is determined by a
thermocouple.
• This dissipated heat is a measure of air velocity indicated on
the dial.

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 Air velocity—
kata-Thermometer
• Used mainly for determining cooling power of the air in mine.
• It can also be used to measure velocity.
• Function:
• Rate at which heat is removed from the heated thermometer.
• The kata is a specially designed thermometer.
• It contains alcohol with bulb at both ends.
• Graduated form 95 oF to 100 oF for standard .
• 130 oF to 135 oF for blue Kata.

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Air velocity—
kata-Thermometer
• Alcohol is caused to rise into the upper bulb by heating the
lower bulb in the flask containing hot water.
• Then the kata is dried and suspended in the air stream.
• Time required for the alcohol to drop from 100 oF to 95 oF is
recorded.
• Each kata is calibrated by the manufacture with a “kata
factor”.
• Kata factor is
• The heat liberated by the thermometer during the o5 temperature
change divided by the surface area of the lower bulb.

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Air velocity—
kata-Thermometer
• If the kata factor is divide by the cooling time in seconds then
the cooling power of the (H c) results.
• When the kata bulb is encased in a moistened wick then
• It is called wet kata.
• For the velocity of air dry kata is used.
• Charts are used to find the air stream velocity.
• Fig. 6-3 page 111

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Air velocity—
Pitot Tube
• Pitot tube are used for velocity ranges.
• It is considered to be the most accurate instrument.
• It determines, total and static head at any point in an airway
or duct.
• Velocity head is recorded as the difference of the total head
and static head.
• Velocity of air is then determined as below.
𝐻
• 𝑉 = 1098
𝜔

• It may also be read from fig. 5-11

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Air velocity—
Pitot Tube
• The pitot tube consists of two concentric tubes.
• The tube is bent in L-shape.
• Operation;
• The instrument is pointed in the direction of air flow.
• The inner tube open at the end, directed upstream.
• This inner tube measures total head.
• The upper tube is perforated with small openings transverse
to the air flow.
• This upper tube records the static head.

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Air velocity—
Pitot Tube
• Average velocity;
• The velocity heads determined at various points should not be
averaged together.
• The velocity corresponding to each head be calculated and
these results averaged.
• The difference is however smaller.
• For correct average velocity, the square roots of the pitot
tube readings (√𝐻𝑣 ) can be added together and averaged.
1098
• Then multiplied by
√ω
• It will give us average velocity.

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Pitot Tube

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Techniques of measuring velocity
• Variation in velocity of at different cross section of the air.
• Several techniques for measuring average velocity.
• They may be classified as
1. Single measurements
2. Multiple measurements
• Each of them can be further divide into
a. Fixed-point or
b. Continuous traversing

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Techniques of measuring velocity
• Single measurement:
• Single or one point is the simplest, fastest but least accurate.
• Readings are taken at of the maximum velocity in the airway.
• The instrument is held at the center of the duct or airway.
• The average velocity is then calculated by equation 5-12.
• 𝑉 = 0.8 ∗ 𝑉𝑚𝑎𝑥 −−−−−−−−−−−−−−−−−−− −5-12

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Techniques of measuring velocity
• Multiple measurement:
• A series of readings are taken.
• The instrument is either stationary mounted at predetermined
points or
• By continuous traversing (hand held).
• Continuous traversing is done with vane anemometer.
• It is more rapid and satisfactory for routine survey.
• Traversing is started at the corner of the airway and proceeds
back in regular fashion.
• This movement is continued till the cross section is covered in
a given time (usually one minute).

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Continuous traversing
Start

End

38
Techniques of measuring velocity
• Fixed point traversing:
• Usually carried out with the help of pitot tube.
• Pitot tube is stationary and mounted.
• Precise survey is guaranteed.
• It may also be carried out with hand held vane anemometer at
pre determined points.
• Average velocity is determined by averaging the results of the
individual measurements.
• Fixed point traversing is also called equal area traversing.
• The area is divide equally.

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Techniques of measuring velocity
• Fixed point traversing:
• A circular or elliptical opening is divided equally into
concentric circles.
• A rectangular or square opening is broken down into equal
areas similar in shape of the airway.
• See fig. 6-5 b, c.
• Circular cross-section:
• Horizontal and vertical center lines are laid first.
• Then concentric circles of equal area are constructed.
• Intersection of alternate ones with the center lines are
located.

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Techniques of measuring velocity
• Velocity readings are taken at these intersection.
• Three, four or five circles may be constructed.
• It results into 12,16 or 20 readings respectively.
• Mathematically the radii are calculated as below.
2𝑥−1
• 𝑅𝑥 =𝑅 -------------------------------- 6-3
2𝑁
• Where
• 𝑅 = radius of the airway
• 𝑥=number of that group of readings
• 𝑁 = number of alternate circle.
• 2𝑁 =number of equal areas.

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Techniques of measuring velocity
• For example:
• If 20 readings are required then
• N=20/4 = 5 alternate circles are required.
• It means 10 equal areas.
• Radius of the first circle is
1
• 𝑅1=𝑅 = 0.316R
10

3
• 𝑅2=𝑅 = 0.548R
10

5
• 𝑅3=𝑅 = 0.707R
10

• And so on

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Air Quantity
• Quantity of air is calculated from velocity of air and cross-
sectional area of the airway.
• Q=VA ------------ --------------------------------------------- 6-4

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