The mechanical properties of mine roof strata affect the safety of fully mechanized mining face. The roof is easy to collapse, under the action of cutting vibration and gravity. In ultra-thin coal seams with a thickness of less than 0.8 meters and relatively high coal hardness, the cutting of coal mining machines will cause serious interference to the weak roof, thereby reducing coal quality and endangering production safety. To address this issue, this study established a cutting dynamics model of the shearer drum for ultra-thin coal seams under soft roof conditions using the discrete element method in EDEM. Based on the single factor method and using the top plate damage rate as the evaluation index, the influence of drum structure and operating parameters on soft top plate damage was systematically studied. The results show that the drum diameter is 650 mm, the hub diameter is 325 mm, the traction speed is 2 m/min, and the cutting depth is 650 mm under the single factor condition, and the shearer drum in ultra-thin coal seam has achieved the best cutting effect respectively.

extremely thin coal seam, shearer, discrete element method, roof damage