Cost calculator Granite deposits and quarries
Granite is an igneous rock widely used around the world. Due to its high hardness, durability, wear resistance and resistance to changes in temperature and weather, it is used in construction everywhere.
Where is granite extracted?
There are around 200 quarries and deposits of granite around the world. It is mined in Italy, Greece, Bulgaria, India, Brazil, China and Russia. The world's best granite is considered Indian. High quality granite is mined in Karelia, as well as in Ukraine. However, even in such countries as Saudi Arabia, South Africa, the U.S., Australia and Kazakhstan have their own excellent deposits of granite.
In Ukraine there are many granite quarries - more than 20, but the most famous are in Zhitomir and Korostyshov. Here develop extraction of gray granodiorite, gabbro, labradorite, red granite and other precious stones.
How to mine granite in Ukraine
Mining granite is a complicated technological process. The aim of it - to get at the output billet with a minimum number of defects and cracks.
For the extraction of minerals used several basic methods:
- Direct blasting of rock with explosives. Holes are drilled in the rock, explosives are placed there... bang, and the rock breaks away. There is a lot of waste, large portions of the splintered rock have many defects and cracks.
- Burocline method. The workpiece is cut to a certain depth along the contour, then cracks are widened with wedges until part of the rock separates from the main massif. Minimal waste and high quality of the workpieces.
- "Silent blasting" with expanding mixtures. Applied to deposits with low tensile strength. The method is similar to the burocline method, but instead of wedges, the same expanding mixtures are used.
- Stonecutter. This is performed by cutting blanks with disc and band (wire) saws using artificial diamonds on the cutting edge. The method is labor-intensive but the quality of the workpieces is high.
- With the use of an air cushion. Holes are drilled and containers of air are placed under high pressure. The method is used for the production of paving stones.
In Soviet-occupation times, when plans were chased, and the next five-year plan was to be ahead of the previous one, granite was extracted by quick and cheap, but most barbaric method - with the use of explosives. For the most part, the explosion left a lot of trash rock, which was further processed into gravel. The remaining larger pieces had many defects and were labor-intensive to produce and there were many rejects, but in the reports were beautiful figures.
Nowadays, the method of stone-cutting is most commonly used, when there is little waste and the pieces of rock have minimal damage and require minimal labor to bring them to semi-finished products in the form of slabs.
What are the colors and texture of granite mined in Ukraine
Granite consists mainly of feldspars and quartz, but due to the different mineral inclusions have different colors and shades, different grains and texture, which implies a change in the physical and chemical characteristics. In different deposits of the country the composition of the rock is different, so their color and grain size will be different. Correspondingly, there is a coarse-, medium- and fine-grained structure of the rock, which significantly affects both its physical properties and its appearance. Granite with coarse and medium grain is more resistant to atmospheric factors, so it is used more for exterior decoration and monuments, while granite with fine grain is used more for interior decoration.
