Blog post on pipe handling safety in the underground hard rock mining environment.

High pressure water as an ore flow solution: A mining innovation partnership between MacLean Engineering and Newcrest's Telfer mine in Western Australia delivers the world's first-ever sub level water cannon. http://www.macleanengineering.com/media-en/the-rig-report/180-wc3-water-cannon

Prohibitive ventilation costs as mines go deeper and concerns about worker health and safety are ushering in a new era in propulsion options for underground mining.

Drawpoint hang-ups represent significant impediments to getting the resource out of the ground in the safest, most expedient way, while oversize blocks of ore are tough for scoops to handle. So the business case for keeping the ore flowing is compelling. A MacLean blog post on addressing the gap between block caving animations and block caving real-life. www.macleanengineering.com

Whether it’s a low hang-up in a drawpoint, or oversize rock on the ground that’s too large for scoops to handle and too disruptive to get rid of with concussion blasting, it’s your secondary reduction rig that solves the problem and ensures that production isn’t held up. And when it’s not tasked with this mission, it can be put to use for ancillary drilling for mine services. www.macleanengineering.com

GEN-3 Feeds on MacLean Bolter: Ground support innovation delivers installation quality, safety, productivity & versatility http://www.macleanengineering.com/media-en/the-rig-report/179-gen-3-scissor-bolter-feeds

Oversized hang-ups present significant challenges to ore flow for mine operators. MacLean’s comprehensive suite of ore flow solutions starts with Water Cannons as a first line of attack to bring down hang-ups; it progresses to low, medium, and highreach Blockholer drills for persistent hang-ups and secondary breaking; then moves to the Mobile Rockbreaker for fragmenting the oversize at source without blasting. www.macleanengineering.com

An ideas instead of mining boom has a nice ring to it as a slogan, but what if mining booms and ideas booms are one in the same? http://www.macleanengineering.com/blog/getting-innovation-right

A few extra metres per day of advance can represent significant increases in the value of an ore body over a mine’s life, so rapid development isn’t just a buzzword, it’s now a business imperative. www.macleanengineering.com

Making front suspension the standard, not the option: An increasing body of research is linking chronic Whole Body Vibration exposure to musculosketal disorders such as lower back pain, and these disorders are now the leading cause of chronic injury and absenteeism in the Canadian and US workforces. So for a mining industry facing prolonged pricing headwinds, keeping workers healthy and productive isn’t just the right thing to do, it’s also essential to surviving the downcycle to prosper on the other side.

The successful introduction of battery power to hard rock mining isn’t going to be about the correct choice of battery chemistry alone, it will be about engineering a battery propulsion system that is fit-for-purpose with the mining application and duty cycle, and one with maximum flexibility to allow for the rapid pace of battery technology advances that will inevitably open up options for diesel-free mine planning and retrofitting. http://www.macleanengineering.com/media-en/blog

Dry drilling on MacLean Small Section Bolter - In 2015, MacLean worked with Petra Diamonds’ Finsch mine in South Africa, the second largest diamond mine in the RSA, to develop a dry drilling option that was required for Finsch’s unique application / mine plan needs. www.macleanengineering.com

483 MSHA reportable injuries involving jacklegs occurred at US mines between 2003 and 2012, according to a recent study published by NIOSH (Clark et al., 2016). And these are just the reportable injuries - if you consider the “Heinrich Safety Triangle”, this can be viewed as the tip of the iceberg. What are the options for mechanization?

MacLean Hard Rock Equipment R&D Report: The last 12 months at MacLean have seen the culmination of a two-year phase of intense product development activity, including fleet electrification; face bolting on the MacLean 975 Omnia Bolter; and, a new, ultra-versatile utility vehicle for high reach/heavy load applications - the MacLean LR3.

FLEET ELECTRIFICATION THAT CONNECTS THE MINING CYCLE TO THE BATTERY CYCLE: The MacLean approach to battery propulsion is built on giving our customers access to best-in-class battery, electric motor, onboard charging, and vehicle analytics technology, and then successfully integrating these components into mobile underground equipment by leveraging our multi-discipline engineering expertise, hard rock mining knowledge, and custom manufacturing experience. In other words, you can’t just understand the battery cycle, you need to understand the mining cycle in which it will be used. This is how MacLean has developed battery power, engineered for life underground.

The drivers pushing mining companies to seriously look at the EV transition encompass a broad range of benefits – reduced ventilation requirements (30-50% less) and associated energy costs, elimination of diesel fuel costs (tens of thousands of dollars per EV unit, per year), reduced maintenance costs (some 25% fewer parts on EV propulsion vs. diesel propulsion rigs), elimination of diesel fine particular matter in the underground environment, and last but definitely not least - less noise, vibration and heat for miners operating the equipment underground. So how do you quantify the operational savings?

The cause for the large drop in fall-of-ground fatalities in Ontario, Canada since the 1960s can be attributed to a variety of factors including increased regulation, better engineering and ground support practices, and the buildup of a stronger culture of safety in mines.

The robots are coming: Taking the miner out of mining is the common theme these days as the pace of advance of artificial intelligence quickens, as big data goes from a buzz phrase to business-as-usual, and as the move through semi to full automation continues. Autonomous operation is on all the major mining companies’ innovation roadmaps. At some point down the road, that is where the bulk of the industry will end up. But we have lots of ground to cover and many years of advances to get through, before we get there in a broad sense. How to manage the transition years is the big question, for mining companies and manufacturers alike.

A new era of underground mining is underway. BEV (battery electric vehicle) propulsion on mobile fleets means less energy required for ventilation and less additional heat generated as mines go deeper. It means a working environment free from diesel fine particulate matter. And it means reduced planned maintenance requirements and total cost of ownership for high-tramming utility vehicles like the MacLean EV Series BT3 Boom Truck. MacLean connected the battery cycle to the mining cycle by engineering the integration of best-in-class electric drive components from around the world to deliver a BEV solution that is safe, proven and data-rich. Battery electric power, built for life underground.

Ramp trials of the MacLean BT3 battery electric boom truck in Canada - Switching out diesel fuel for battery electricity on mobile equipment in underground mining is as much of a user experience exercise as it is an engineering exercise.

Sometimes a turning point can only be seen clearly in hindsight. Such is the case for the mine of the future as we begin 2018, coming out of a 2017 where major mining companies continued to demonstrate capital spending austerity and focus on debt reduction. All the while, there were growing signals that digitalization, electrification and automation were all gaining momentum, even though actual examples of minesite implementations could as of yet, still be counted on one hand. MacLean took the opportunity that industry downturn presented over the past several years to focus intensely on three key product development ventures – first and foremost, the battery electrification of our entire fleet, which will be complete by the end of 2018; second, the successful introduction of face bolting as a feature on our 975 Omnia bolter; and, third, the launch of the latest addition to our utility vehicle product line – the LR3 Boom Lift for heavy load and high reach applications. The past year was one where for the first time we had a fleet of battery electric vehicles working underground, allowing us the ability to validate our performance and total cost of ownership (TCO) models with real-world data, while at the same time continuing to build out our EV offer across the product lines. Looking forward, as we work hard to fully electrify our fleet of ground support, ore flow/secondary reduction, and utility vehicles, we’re keenly aware that electrification is but one step in the ongoing mechanization of underground mining, a transition to the mine of the future that will be increasingly efficient through digitalization and automation that will increase production and reduce costs.

The All-Electric Mine of the Future, and the Need for Good Roadbeds NOW Click the link below to learn more: http://www.macleanengineering.com/blog

Electrification now competes for attention in underground mining projects. Click the below link to know more: https://www.macleanengineering.com/blog-view-all/ev-momentum-inevitability

Underground mining is at an interesting place right now, with the availability of diesel-free, battery electric equipment in most of the vehicle categories except heavy haulage, with that gap being actively addressed by a number of OEMs and the solution, not something to be relegated to the distant future as a theoretical. It’s coming, along with fast charge capabilities underground.