Heavy Equipment | Progress Garant

Heavy Equipment
for mining industry

Mining is one of the most vital components of modern society due to the use of mined minerals in almost every consumer product. Additionally, 50% of the nation’s energy comes from coal or nuclear power that uses uranium. To support this need for modern equipment we work with big range of producers.

Types of Mining and Respective Equipment

Mining can happen at the surface or underground. The environment and type of material mined dictate the form of mining required and the equipment used. Both surface and underground mining have three main steps:

Extraction

This involves drilling, blasting, or digging to remove materials from the mine site

Material handling

This includes sorting and loading materials to either go to a waste area or the processing site

Material processing

The final step involves grinding, separating, crushing, refining, and smelting mined ore or other goods at an off-site plant to turn them into finished products

Equipment Provided

Moving materials at surface mines

Carrying up to a 400-ton payload

Hauling materials up steep slopes

To move materials around a mine site, workers need heavy-duty trucks. Also known as off-highway trucks, large mining trucks include both powerful mechanical models and environmentally friendly electric drive models.

Unlike conventional trucks, these mining vehicles have extra-large tires to support the heavy loads over uneven terrain commonly found around surface mines.

Additionally, these trucks can carry high payload capacities to accommodate the need for moving weighty mined minerals or ore out of the site. Large mining trucks also need to perform in the most extreme conditions — cold, heat, heavy dust, high altitudes, and steep slopes while hauling heavy loads.

Moving earth or mined materials

Digging

Scooping material into a loader

Transporting some mined materials

Removing rock or dirt, also known as overburden, from surface mines to open the site

Sometimes called excavators, mining shovels used today grew out of the original steam shovel design used in years past. The models used now often employ hydraulics for moving the shovel to power through tough materials.

Overall, hydraulic mining shovels have similarities in their designs. Most have a base with either tracks or wheels atop which the pivoting cab sits. The pivoting action allows the operator to access material in a circle around the shovel without moving significantly. An articulated arm holds the shovel, both of which the operator controls from inside the cab.

Raking the land around a mine site

Ripping plant matter out of the ground

Reclaiming the land around mining sites

Building mine sites by pushing the surface material away to expose the ground beneath

Maintaining a mine site by pushing dirt away from working areas

Large mining dozers move materials easily around a mining site. Plus, the choice of vehicles with wheels or tracks increases the types of surfaces these dozers can operate on. Additional attachments can change the dozers’ uses.

Transporting material

Transferring mined material to a loader

Removing overburden to prepare a mine site

Moving earth

Removing boulders

Digging through hard materials

Instead of using hydraulics to control the movement of the shovel at the end of the arm, electric rope shovels use a series of pulleys and ropes. Unlike hydraulic shovels, these models use electric operation, allowing for highly efficient performance over time.

Uses of electric rope shovels mimic those of hydraulic excavators.

Creating holes for blasting charges for surface mining

Production drilling to make wells

Presplit rock drilling

Expanding mines

Rotary drill rigs create holes through rock or soil, allowing placement of charges for blasting open mines. A rotary drill rig is one of two main types of drills used for mining. The other type is a percussion or hammer drill. For a rotary drill rig, the drill bit turns under pressure to cut into the rock. As the bit turns, the rock grinds down while compressed air sends it back up the drill to the top to keep the hole and bit clean.

Ideally, rotary drill bits create holes that range from 6 to 22 inches in diameter and average 30 to 60 feet deep. In some cases, though, miners will use rotary drills to dig holes up to 150 feet deep and as shallow as 15 feet.

For hammer rock drills, pressure forcefully shoves the bit into the ground to create a hole. To keep the hole clean, compressed air blows dirt out of the way to allow the bit to always strike new ground. Hammer drills with the piston located outside the hole (OTH) typically drill smaller holes of 5 inches or fewer in diameter.

Creating proper grades to allow water to drain away from roads

Pushing surface material to clear roads

Constructing
haul roads

Mines rarely have ready access to roads. Even those near major roadways still need roads built within the area for moving material and hauling mined goods out. Motor graders are used for surface operations around mines to create and maintain these roads.

When hauling minerals, ore, or other mined materials along roads, things like debris or ponding water can slow vehicles. Motor graders ensure the roads have the necessary grading and adequate drainage. By maintaining the integrity of roads used for transporting the material around and out of the mining area, motor graders play a vital role in ensuring the efficiency of the mine’s operations.

Supporting jobs of other loading and transport vehicles on-site

Loading materials onto trucks for transport

Digging

For picking up and quickly moving material across a mining site for loading into trucks, nothing matches the versatility of large wheel loaders. Sizes vary from compact to large. As the wheel loader’s size increases, its bucket capacity and load handling also go up. Matching the wheel loader’s handling capabilities for both volume and density of materials at the mine is crucial to ensure the machine will hold up to the rigors of daily use without premature wear.

For wheel loaders, the compact models work best with light materials and have a bucket capacity of 2 cubic yards. However, large models can handle iron ore or rock and can hold up to 38 cubic yards of rock in the bucket. You will have a varied selection of wheel loaders to fit in the space around your surface mine and handle the loads you need to move.

Moving tons of overburden to prepare a surface mine

Cutting into high wall surfaces and removing material

Reducing emissions compared to other overburden removal methods

Removing exposed material, such as tar sand, from a strip mine

Draglines are large excavators with a bucket supported by ropes and wires at the end of a boom. Lowering the bucket and scraping it along the ground collects overburden or mined material.

Swinging the bucket at the end of the dragline around repositions it to dump its contents into a specified location. Surface mining heavily uses draglines.

Building roads

Making initial cuts into the land for a mine

Performing mining operations

Reclaiming land

Wheel tractor scrapers have a design similar to motor graders. However, the scrapers typically have an attached bin that collects the material removed from the ground’s surface rather than pushing it to the side as a grader does.

To operate the scraper, the driver uses controls inside the cab to raise or lower the bin to the ground. When on the ground, the edge of the bin scrapes the ground materials, which feed directly into the bin. When filled, a vertical flap holds the material inside the bin, so it does not spill during transport. At the deposit location, the bin tilts and opens in the rear to empty the scraped dirt.

Loading rock or mined material into trucks

Transporting material to the surface

Digging

Underground mining trucks and loaders require specific operating parameters to function in confined spaces. Additionally, these vehicles cannot produce emissions in the enclosed environment of a mine. Therefore, standard trucks used for surface mining will not suffice for underground work.

Mining trucks and loaders for underground operations have specially built engines that do not produce emissions but still have enough power to move tons of rock.

Choose us

We want to be your source for all machinery, parts, and more for your mining operation. Whether you need new equipment, rentals, service, power solutions, fluid analysis, or parts, we can help you find what you need.

If you need more information or need to request a quote, contact us by filling out a form or calling us at +971 58 272 52 30

form

Heavy Equipment for mining industry

Types of Mining and Respective Equipment

Mining can happen at the surface or underground. The environment and type of material mined dictate the form of mining required and the equipment used. Both surface and underground mining have three main steps:

Extraction

Material handling

Material processing

Equipment Provided

Choose us

Heavy Equipment
for mining industry