Datamine Discover KB - Drillholes

Are drillhole HoleIDs case sensistive?

kbadmin — Wed, 05 Nov 2025 03:46:28 GMT

Yes Discover Drillhole tools was compare HoleID primary keys with case sensitive.

There is a validation option to check for Collar name mismatch, this will return any HoleID values which are not found in the Collar table, including case differences only.

It is recommonded to convert all HoleID field values to upper case to avoid issues.

Discover 2021 - where has generate plans gone?

kbadmin — Tue, 14 Sep 2021 03:57:34 GMT

Occurrence

I have installed Discover 2021, and the option to Generate Plans in the Drillholes>Generate Sections tool is gone

Solution

You should have 2 new menu options in Discover 2021 next to Generate Section, Generate Plans and Batch Generate Sections.

If these menu options are missing, you will need to manually reset your menus by -

1. Close MapInfo Discover

2. Delete the folder -

C:\Users\USERNAME\AppData\Roaming\Encom\Discover\Ribbons

3. Start MapInfo Discover and your menu will automatically be reset.

How do I display voxel / block models on my cross-sections?

Josh Knight — Wed, 03 Feb 2021 02:28:08 GMT

Discover3D can not only display mining package block models and create voxel models, it also has the ability to export voxel models as vector slices along multiple cross-sections. These vector slices are automatically associated with the cross-sections (i.e. automatically recognised and handled by the Section Manager), and comprise a polygon for each intersected voxel cell, attributed with that voxel cell's value.

This capability therefore opens a wealth of further analytical options within your 2D drillhole cross-sections. For example, resource calculations assisted via clipping these voxel slice polygons to interpreted high grade regions, or converting these vector slices into gridded surfaces for more advanced visualisation (e.g. contouring) and analysis.

Example

For instance, this functionality allows you to effortlessly take a 3D voxel model of say Cu mineralisation, such as :

And slice / intersect them across multiple 2D sections, producing attributed polygons representing the sliced voxel cells on a per section basis:

Solution

1/. Ensure the target cross-sections are ...

How do I refresh my drillhole data and regenerate a section?

kbadmin — Thu, 28 Jan 2021 23:30:01 GMT

Occurrence

Existing drillhole cross-sections and plans may need to be updated after updates and additions to a drillhole projects collar, survey and/or downhole data tables. Examples of changes to these files that may warrant section regeneration include:

- new drillholes are added to a project (including splay/daughter holes)

- new downhole data intervals (from/to) added, such as hole extensions

- new columns are added to the table for new assay elements

Solution

1/. Ensure the drillhole project's source MapInfo Pro tables have been updated with the new information, whether these need to be refreshed via a database link, appended to or replaced linked files.

If the source tables are linked tables, such as Excel, CSV or Access database, if there are no changes to the columns and table structure, simply overwrite the file with the new file (keep the name the same). For the collar table, you will also need to update the point locations using Discover>Update Coordinates

NOTE DO NOT refresh linked tables by going back to the Open table and overwriting the existing tab file. The ...

I have lost my list of Drillhole Projects or sessions. How can I recover them?

kbadmin — Mon, 09 Sep 2019 00:43:10 GMT

Occurrence

If you computer has changed you may have lost your program settings for Discover and other programs stored in -

C:\Users\USERNAME\AppData\Roaming\

This means your list of known drillhole project will be lost.

Solution

You can import any drillhole project from its folder to add it to the list.

Select Drillholes>Open>Import Project.

Browse to the folder the the drillhole project was stored in and select the *.dhproject file to import. If you have forget where you had saved these, you can search in windows explorer for *.dhproject file types.

Drillhole Pierce Points - a powerful way to analyze and enhance your long-sections

kbadmin — Wed, 04 Sep 2019 01:27:24 GMT

The Create Pierce Point Layer tool is found within the Section Manager -

This converts downhole intervals into attributed MapInfo Professional Point symbols. This significantly enhances the display and analytical options for this data on long- and cross-sections, such as:

A range of label positions for composited intervals, such as created with the Downhole Object Clip tool. Pierce points can be created at the top, mid-point, or bottom of an interval; the shallowest of deepest RL; or the location closest to or furthest from the viewer.

Use of MapInfo Pro symbols to highlight and reinforce particular intercepts (for instance, locations where boreholes have intercepted an aquifer/watertable)

Thematic mapping or geochemical data classification of pierce points (derived from clipped to 3D volume and/or composited intervals) allows for the powerful and effective display of high grade (or grams per meter) intercept values.

Surface gridding / interpolation of pierce points values (such as grade or gram/meter values) extends the advanced analysis and trend interpretation options, including resource calculations.

Some examples of the various pierce point outputs, and the display and analysis options they provide:

(1) Using a source file of downhole assays clipped to an orebody volume and then Composited by Cut-Off Grade, resulting in discrete high-grade intercepts.

Discover and MapInfo Professional can import an extensive range of industry standard and 3rd party data formats.

The attached PDF (bottom of the page) list all supported formats under the following categories, and for each format details the location of the required import tool.

Tabular and Vector data (including databases, contour files, text files, GIS formats such as Shape and geopackage etc)
Raster Imagery (such as aerial photography, SPOT imagery, company logos, etc)
Gridded Surfaces (such as digital elevation models & geophysical grids, multibanded remote sensing data such as LANDSAT) - requires a 3D license for 3D visualization and processing
Drillhole & Trench data (such as collars points and downhole survey, downhole assays and wireline LAS logs) - requires a 3D license for 3D visualization and processing
GPS Data (such as GPX)
3D Vector Data (such as DXF of mine plans and drives, ore grade shells) - requires a 3D license for 3D visualization and processing
3D Resources Models (such as 3D vectors or block/voxel models, geophysical inversion models such as Magnetic or EM targets) - requires a 3D license

A range of additional formats can be imported using MapInfo's TABLE>Universal Translator (which is based on Safe Software's Feature Manipulation Engine (FME)).

Can I add custom polygon fill patterns to those available in MapInfo Pro?

kbadmin — Sun, 14 Oct 2018 23:53:31 GMT

You cannot add or edit the existing fill patterns listed in MapInfo Professional polygon styles.

There is a third party tool that does this -

https://fillpattern.com/#

You can create a series of objects that will imitate a fill pattern using Discover>Map Making>Apply See Thru Shading or MODIFY>Edit>Custom Patterns.

You can add custom bitmaps into the C:\Users\USERNAME\AppData\Roaming\Encom\Common\Fill_Patterns- these will then appear within the Legend (Colour Pattern) Editor.
However they will not appear when applied to a 2D cross section. They will only work in the Discover3D or PA windows.

I cannot edit my Drillhole tables

kbadmin — Wed, 18 Apr 2018 23:20:15 GMT

Occurrence

In Discover 2016 or later, when I open my drillhole project and go to edit the data in a browser, I cannot edit it.

Solution

As MapInfo and TAB files are 2D only, Discover needs to import and convert these into a suitable 3D database format in the background when opening/creating a Drillhole project.

This is due to the Drillhole project now opens the 3D cache database, which is a geopackage tables. You will notice if you hover over the tables in the explorer, the tooltip will indicate they are stored in -

C:\Users\USERNAME\AppData\Roaming\Encom\Discover\PROJECTNAME

MapInfo only supports a geopackage being opened in a read only state.

To Edit these, open the drillhole project, then select the DRILLHOLES>Edit Data tool. Note this dialog cannot be closed whilst you are editing you original tables in MapInfo.

Once finished editing, simply click Done and it will save, refresh, validate, desurvey and validate your drillhole database and reopen the geopackage tab file.

How to display high-grade intercepts on drillhole sections, and create informative labels for them.

Josh Knight — Wed, 05 Nov 2014 01:55:00 GMT

Occurrence

Are you trying create and effectively display high-grade intercepts on your cross-sections and long-sections? Here are some pro-tips.

Solution

1/. Ensure you have composited your downhole assay table with the appropriate method / parameters (using Drillholes>Downhole Compositing). For instance, you may have composited the Au field with By Cut-Off Grade, using a cut-off value of 0.5g/t, and a minimum length of 5m. Also ensure that the resulting composited table is automatically added to the drillhole project by enabling the following option (the project will be re-cached during this process).

The resulting composited table may look similar in structure to this:

2/. If the cross/long-section already exists, you will need to first Regenerate the section to incorporate this new downhole data table, using the option in the Section Manager:

Solution

A couple of tips that may assist you with the current version of Discover (v2013).

1/. To highlight 'Planned' holes.

In addition to adding the planned hole/s' collar (and survey entries if needed) information, add a single lithology entry for each planned hole to the lithology table, spanning it's entire depth (e.g. From 0 To 300). Assign an attribute such a 'Planned' to the appropriate lithology field. We'll be leveraging this via a lithology trace shade. When the updates are done, Save the changes, and 'Recache the Drillhole Project'.

In the projects 'lithology' legend (in the Legend Editor), add a new row, called 'Planned' and set a colour/pattern that stands out for planned holes (my example below is orange vertical stripes).

Then apply this to one or more sections. Example output as below:

2/. To separate drillholes by type

a. Add a 'Type' character field to your project's collar table, and attribute as necessary (such as 'RAB', 'RC' and 'Planned'). Save, and Recache the project.

b. Create 3 queries (I used Discover's Data Utilites>Select by Group) from this collar tab ...

How do I create grade/metal thickness contours in drillhole long/cross-sections or plans?

kbadmin — Thu, 07 Feb 2013 00:53:05 GMT

It’s a simple three step process to produce your grade-thickness contours:

· Calculate the grade-thickness values

· Grid these in either the long or cross section or a collar plan

· Contour this grid

The procedure is outlined in the following steps. It requires your drillhole data to be part of a Discover
Drillhole Project, with the assay data set as a downhole data table.

1) Grade*Thickness calculation

Go to Table->Maintenance->Table Structure and add 2 float columns to your Assay table called
(for example) 'Interval' and ‘Grade_thickness’.

Use Table->Update Column to populate the Interval field as below (Interval = Depth_to - Depth_from).

Then use the Table->Update Column to populate the Grade_thickness field as below
(Grade_thickness = Assay_field x Interval ).

Save the assay table.

2) Create the required cross/long sections or plans

Use Drillholes>Define New Section or Plan to create the sections or plans.

3) Crea ...

Drillhole validation issues and how to resolve them

Josh Knight — Thu, 15 Dec 2011 04:52:43 GMT

Discover's new drillhole project Validation Tool (in version 2011) is a powerful and comprehensive error-checking facility, essential for problem-free section/plan generation and annotation.

This tool will consecutively check the project's collar, survey and downhole data tables as assigned during Project Setup. For each of these drillhole data types, the Validation tool will present both Compulsory (ticked and greyed out) and Optional (can be enabled by user) error checks. See Discover's interactive Help system for detailed use of this functionality.

Below are the Errors that may be listed by this tool, and their common causes and resolutions. The content of this article is also available as a PDF attachment for offline reference.

NOTES:

1. If using a database or shared dataset (e.g. read-only files on a server), it is strongly recommended to resolve all issues in the source dataset, not just on the user's local native MI Pro table copies.

2. All data changes should be first checked and verified against field logs/records.

3. Failure to resolve compulsory errors will cause or erroneous/misleading section displays.

Collar Validation report

Mismatched Collar Object (compulsory)

Cause - The spatial position of a collar (in the map window) does not match the values in the assigned collar easting/northing fields. The collar object may have been either:

Physically moved/edited, or

Occurrence

In the Discover Log (strip) display tool, a depth to mm/cm scale can be specified.

Also in the Display Downhole data tool, linegraphs can be specified a units to mm/cm.

How do I print these to preserve the correct mm/cm scale?

Solution

For Log (strip) display, then you should print the layout window at a 1:1 scale.

For section window, they ought to be printed at the map scale at which to Display downhole data was applied (you can check this by using Drillholes>Create Section Legend).

How do I determine the midpoint XYZ coordinates for each of my downhole intervals?

Josh Knight — Tue, 19 Jul 2011 04:15:54 GMT
You can use DRILLHOLES>3D Coordinates to show the XYZ for midpoints, along with end points or start points. They can also be viewed in 3D, using Discover3D>3D Coordinates

Encom fonts files are missing or black square symbols are appearing

kbadmin — Fri, 08 Jul 2011 04:04:57 GMT
Occurrence

After upgrading/installing Discover, the symbols such as Collar and EOH symbols on sections and certain map symbols are displaying as black Squares.

Solution

After installing/upgrading Encom Discover, you will need to restart Windows to complete the update of the Encom ET font files.

Querying the EOH (end-of-hole) geology for each drillhole in a project

Josh Knight — Wed, 24 Dec 2008 03:55:28 GMT
The following example uses a a downhole geology/lithology table called Lithology, with a target field called GeolCode.

After opening the Drillhole Project, Run the Drillholes>Analyse>Max/EOH tool, and populate as follows:

Two options exist for analysing EOH data; either Use deepest sample/interval or EOH Check.

When selecting Use deepest sample/interval the values for the selected column report the interval at which the last downhole data value appears.

When selecting EOH Check the values for the selected columns, by default report an EOH depth as specified in the collar table. A data value may or may not exist at the reported depth. If no data values exist at the EOH depth two text boxes No sample string and No sample value are available to populate user defined null values. The numerical toggle box for the EOH Check option allows a fault tolerance value to be set. For example, if the total depth for a drill hole was 100m and the last sample interval was 99m the EOH values would be a null. If a fault tolerance value of 1 was set the EOH routine would report the EOH value at 99m. The fault tolerance only applies to EOH values which are null or are not populated with an interval value.