MechChem Africa March-April 2021

⎪ Power transmission, bearings, bushes and seals ⎪

Locally assembled drive solutions Henco du Plooy, Managing Director of Bonfiglioli in South Africa, talks about his company’s heavy duty bevel helical and parallel shaft gear units.

technical design department was quick to meet the challenge to implement the neces- sary upgrades required to overcome these conditions. Standard oil seals were replaced with silicon based versions that could handle the extremes in temperature, while oil heat- ers were installed on all units to pre-heat the gear reducer prior to start-up in the cold conditions. As a result of this success, we were awarded eight projects for sixdifferentmines in the area. Due to our extensive local stock holding of components, all fifteen conveyor power packs andfive feeder driveunits couldbebuilt fromstock, which enabled our local assembly centre to meet the necessary deadline as re- quiredby the client.We are accreditedby our parent company to assemble up to the HDP/ HDO140 size in SouthAfrica. The same strict build andquality standards applied at the fac- toryhave tobe adhered to. Thismeans that all branches accredited to assemble gearboxes do so to European factory standard.

Since 2008, we have been building our project capability. This includes access to a global technical platform. Through this communication portal, our local engineer- ing department has access to a worldwide database of applications, which enables us to offer technically proven solutions with very quick turnaround times. Our local capability can tailor our product offering to suit most environmental conditions. Bonfiglioli has organised its market sup - port and customer assistance functions along clear ‘customer- first’ guidelines. Aware that our direct presence in local markets is the key to long-lasting success, we guarantee the same high standards of Bonfiglioli quality anywhere in the world at any given time. q

B ased on our products’ proven track record and performance on previ- ous installations, we were invited by our clients to tender for the supply of multiple large conveyor and feeder drives for an Eastern EuropeanGoldmine ex- pansion project. The delivery timeframe was critical. Each conveyor drive train assembly (power-pack) needed to include amotor, high speed fluid coupling, gearbox, low speed side flange coupling and safety guards, all assem - bled on a customised fabricated baseplate. For the high torque, low speed feeder drives, we provided a compact drive solution which consisted of a primary helical-bevel gearbox coupled to a final stage planetary reducer. Site conditions posed some techni- cal challenges that needed to be overcome. The installation site would encounter tem- perature swings from -35 °C in the winter months, to +35 °C in summer. Our local

March-April 2021 • MechChem Africa ¦ 11