Modern Mining May 2018

CRUSHING, SCREENING AND MILLING

in South America – have allowed us to keep a close track of trends and to anticipate these trends in our product range,” he says. “This net- working in the ‘global south’ is now expanding through our sister companies in the northern hemisphere, extending into major new markets including Turkey, Saudi Arabia, India, China and the Scandinavian countries.” The focus on the aggregate sector also opens doors to growth in other southern hemisphere countries, he adds, with the size of the aggre- gate industry in Brazil, for instance, exceeding even its substantial mining sector. The cooperation between sister companies to date has been based on design and technical capabilities, as well as manufacturing capacity, and has seen experts from the different compa- nies sharing ideas at screening workshops and sales conferences. Lessons and techniques are shared related to key issues such as accuracy of screening, preventing pegging and blinding on screen media, and replaceability of panels. “Our global colleagues’ experience in screening aggregates is very valuable and we have already been able to share aspects of this with our customers locally,” he says. Roche also emphasises the extent to which Multotec’s market leading achievements have contributed to the collaboration. “We have a ‘golden thread’ running through our business – from concept and design stage, through manufacture and installation, to per- formance monitoring, feedback and design modification,” he says. “This feedback loop has led to continuous improvement of our products, adding value with each new enhancement.” Multotec’s technology leadership also feeds into mining companies’ increased focus on maintenance issues, as mines pursue strategies for higher productivity and cost-effectiveness. He notes that some of the larger miners have established dedicated working groups on main- tenance management, and they have included specialist suppliers like Multotec for their cut- ting edge input. “For example, they are looking for higher levels of predictability in the wear rates of their screen panels,” he says, “as they need greater certainty on mean time between fail- ures (MTBF) to be able to plan maintenance shutdowns with the least possible disruption to production.” While it is vital to constantly extend the MTBF, it is also important to carefully moni- tor wear rates so that precise predictions can be made as to when it is optimal to replace pan- els. The replacement process also needs to be as quick and risk-free as possible to reduce costly

Above: Multotec produces a wide range of screening media using materials such as wedgewire, polyurethane polymers, rubber com- pounds, ceramic com- pounds and various forms of steel. Left: Stringent quality control ensures Multotec’s high quality standards are maintained in all its manu- facturing facilities.

plant downtime and its effect on production levels and revenues. Roche highlights the two main aspects of Multotec’s business that keep it ahead of the game: firstly, understanding in detail what the customer’s application is; and secondly, understanding the manufacturing process to achieve the technical solution for what the customer requires. “To develop and provide the solution that the customer needs, we must understand his whole process – before and after the screen- ing stage,” he says. “Only then will we know what to do to optimise the process and make it more efficient. We realise that the customer has a range of issues to deal with on their mining and processing activities – while we can focus on the details of the metallurgical process and improving it.” 

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May 2018  MODERN MINING  47