Reliability Strategy

Equipment availability is a crucial, primary metric in mining operations, which indicates that trucks, trams, excavators, drills, pumps, curtains, lighting, conveyors, crushers, mills, are in working order and may be deployed.

However, the questions of whether equipment can be deployed or whether it should be deployed are very different. Often, a desire to increase return on capital, by deploying all available equipment, creates a blockage in the mining cycle.

This traffic can result in longer queue times at excavators, waste dumps, hoists, crushers and stockpiles. The inefficient use of labor and fuel also increases unit costs, and this unproductive time can affect maintenance events that are triggered by hours in service. Furthermore, traffic increases fleet cycle times since these are handicapped by the slowest unit in the rotation.

Key Client Challenges:

1. How do we determine the availability and reliability of our equipment accurately?
2. How do we ensure we have sufficient backup machines in case of unexpected equipment failures and at what point should we deploy them?
3. How do we efficiently maintain and service equipment while minimizing unnecessary downtime and maintain availability?
4. How do we better estimate how long the equipment is expected to remain reliable for long-term planning?
5. How do we access and leverage real-time data and historical performance metrics to assess and improve reliability?
6. How do we effectively increase mean time between failures (MBTF) through predictive maintenance technologies?

Poor pace may be a symptom of ageing equipment, operator skills, or mining conditions, specifically, the condition of roads and ramps. Equipment reliability suffers when these are too narrow, steep, have inadequate drainage or debris.

Equipment reliability estimations are based on the probability that available equipment will operate over a scheduled period, at a required rate, under assumed conditions. Managing availability and reliability correctly will unlock significant gains in both throughput and mining costs. However, this can only be optimized when Mine Planning, Maintenance, Operations and Dispatch work together seamlessly.

At Unison Mining, our SMEs can work with your team to implement the systems, processes and behaviors needed through clearly defined KPIs, role planning and incentives to ensure these departments can work together effectively. We help your teams foster an environment of continuous improvement to ensure new ways of working are reinforced long after a project closeout.