Capital Equipment News July 2018

Volvo excavators help put a shine on chrome mining in Madagascar

Volvo EC480D on site in Madagascar.

A team of six Volvo EC480D excavators are the centrepiece of a new mining venture in Madagascar that is extract- ing thousands of tonnes of Chromite ore a day – and helping improve the lives of neighbouring villagers at the same time. Chromium is a relatively rare mineral, with South Africa claiming up to 70% of the earth’s reserves. But neighbouring island Madagascar also has significant deposits, and it was to this, the world’s fourth largest island, that Indian explora- tion firm APC sent its geologists to scout for suitable mining opportunities. They struck lucky, and one day’s drive north of the capital of Antananarivo APC has found and secured the mining concession over a vast 59 000 hectares of chromite-rich land. This is APC’s first venture into running its own mine. New to production the company might be, but its MBA-educated managing director Pari Appusamy knows the value of investing in quality equip- ment. “Excavators are the soul of the whole project,” says Appusamy. “We need them to strip the overburden, then expose and extract the chrome body. Then they load haulers with the ore for transporting the 1,5 km to the beneficiation plant for crushing and processing.”

“While we have bought some used equipment for other parts of the process, it’s crucial that the excavators deliver high uptime over their 12-hour workday, and that is why we invested in a new fleet of six Volvo EC480D excavators. We opted against having lots of smaller machines in favour of fewer, but larger general-pur- pose production machines, which we believed are more suitable for the task. We chose Volvo’s 50-t class excavators because I am a fan of the brand, the ma- chine quality is high and the support we get from Materauto, the local customer support and sub-dealer, is consistently excellent,” adds Appusamy. The excavators are currently working on an ore body that is 25-m wide, 600-m long and 80-m deep. The Volvo EC480D is well suited to the task, as it is a heavy-duty crawler excavator that is said to be excep- tionally productive and lowers operating costs through reduced fuel consumption and simple maintenance requirements. Powered by the D13 Volvo engine, the EC480D delivers high digging and break- out forces, alongside reduced emissions and good fuel efficiency. Chromite is an extremely abrasive ore, and the rock buckets fitted to the excavators have had additional steel welded to prolong bucket life. ❂

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