Modern Mining November 2021

SUPPLY CHAIN News

Booyco Engineering, specialist in robust, custom-engineered air-conditioning sys- tems, is now driving the expansion of its service offering in the mining sector follow- ing the proven success of its products in this demanding industry. The company has been a leader in Booyco Engineering expands HVAC services in mining heating, ventilation and air-conditioning (HVAC) solutions for decades, supplying extensively to the rail, defence and mining industries. Booyco Engineering managing director Brenton Spies says the expan- sion of its mining footprint will help mines improve their vehicle uptime while further enhancing health and safety performance. “Keeping mine vehicle operators cool in the heat of a mining site is crucial to health, safety and operational efficiency,” says Spies. “Standard air-conditioning systems, however, seldom stand the test of time, leading to unexpected failure and unplanned downtime.”

work if the cab becomes over-heated.” The result is that a machine could stand idle, waiting for repairs to the air- conditioning unit while costing hundreds of thousands in lost production for the mine. He says there are two aspects to avoid- ing this risk: installing fit-for-purpose HVAC equipment on mining vehicles; and apply- ing a regular and high quality maintenance schedule. “This is where Booyco Engineering has proved itself to our mining customers,” says Miller. “We engineer the HVAC solution to suit the miner or contractor’s application, and we ensure that the equipment is well maintained.” The company’s design and support capability has been developed over more than 35 years, employing the latest soft- ware and specialised tools in its 3,000 m2 Meadowdale facility. Its technical support services allow customers to rely on Booyco Engineering for a planned maintenance programme for their HVAC systems. “Few mining operations have the skills to conduct this specialised work profes- sionally on a regular basis,” says Spies. “Where the mine is large enough to war- rant an on-site technician or team, we can put that in place as part of a maintenance contract to ensure that all HVAC systems continue performing optimally.”  IMDEX says there is already strong industry interest in BLASTDOG because of its capacity to deliver reliable, real-time data that will enable critical mine planning decisions to be made earlier, introducing greater efficiencies throughout the mining value chain. IMDEX CEO Paul House says no other technology has the capacity to produce the same data and provide as large an impact on downstream processes, includ- ing enhancing productivity. “It has the capacity to improve produc- tivity, efficiency and safety and is part of IMDEX’s internet of geosensing initiative and will significantly increase mine to mill efficiency,” says House. “Moving to a commercial prototype is a significant development. We will work with prospective clients to ensure that when it is released IMDEX BLASTDOG will deliver the results, efficiencies and safety that will be its trademark.” 

Among the factors causing early failure are hotter-than-average ambient tempera- tures, high dust levels, heavy vibrations, shocks from uneven mine haul roads and long operating hours. Grant Miller, Booyco Engineering’s executive director, points to the danger of drivers working in an over- heated cab, should an air-conditioning system fail. “This is not only a danger to the health of the driver, but could affect other work- ers and infrastructure on the mine if the cab conditions cause the vehicle to be driven unsafely,” says Miller. “Fortunately, many countries including South Africa apply reg- ulations to ensure safe working conditions – so an operator could be entitled to cease

A Booyco Engineering HVAC system being installed on a mining vehicle.

Major milestone for IMDEX’s BLASTDOG

Leading global mining-tech company IMDEX has announced a major milestone for IMDEX BLASTDOG, its breakthrough

drill and blast technology. IMDEX BLASTDOG is a semi-auton- omously deployed system for logging

material properties and blast hole characteristics at high spatial den- sity across the bench and mine and is commodity agnostic. It has been developed in col- laboration with Universal Field Robots and tested at mines in Queensland, Western Australia, Chile and Nevada. At a recent industry event, IMDEX said BLASTDOG would move from engineering develop- ment to commercial prototype by the end of the year. Progress was outlined to rep- resentatives from development partners from METS Ignited, as well as other mining sector executives.

BLASTDOG will move from engineering development to commercial prototype by the end of the year.

36  MODERN MINING  November 2021