Liebherr Mining and Compañía Minera Doña Inés de Collahuasi – collectively owned by Anglo American, Glencore, and Japan Collahuasi Assets B.V. – have efficiently deployed a full trolley answer at Collahuasi copper mine website within the Tarapacá area of Chile. The positioning posed distinctive challenges when it got here to designing the trolley line as it’s located at 4500 m above sea stage, the place it’s topic to excessive environmental components akin to excessive winds and seismic exercise.
4 Liebherr T 284 360-t mining vehicles at the moment are working beneath the challenge’s 1 km trolley line.
Milestone achievement
The supply of this entire trolley answer marks a big achievement for Liebherr. The scope of the entire trolley answer included the engineering and manufacturing of the infrastructure, energy system and the vehicles’ onboard {hardware}; implementation and commissioning on website; and coaching and assist for Collahuasi’s staff.
“Whereas the Collahuasi challenge is the primary time we’ve delivered a full trolley answer, we’ve labored extensively with trolley know-how”, says Oliver Weiss, Govt Vice President, R&D, Engineering and Manufacturing, Liebherr-Mining Gear SAS. ‘We’ve equipped 38 360-t trolley vehicles in Panama, 15 360-t trolley vehicles in Zambia and 7 100-t trolley vehicles in Austria. The mixture of this expertise with our in-house experience and shut collaboration with Collahuasi resulted on this glorious final result.”
A collaborative course of
Collahuasi’s trolley line can assist two T 284 ultra-class vehicles working concurrently, because of the ability system’s two 5.5 MW transformers. Elements for the trolley line have been sourced globally, with Liebherr Chile managing the method on the bottom.
“We leveraged our international community to search out the very best assets for this challenge”, says Gonzalo Garcia, Managing Director, Mining, Liebherr Chile. “The engineering of the trolley system’s masts and catenary line came about in Chile. The transformers and the e-house that protects them have been designed and inbuilt South Africa. And auxiliary elements like the stress wheels and get in touch with and messenger wires got here from varied locations in our worldwide provide chain.”
Whereas Collahuasi was chargeable for finishing the civil works wanted to facilitate the set up of the trolley line, Liebherr Chile supplied skilled help with haul highway specs and onsite development.
Retrofitting the pantograph know-how to Collahuasi’s 4 T 284s was managed by Liebherr’s gross sales and repair firm in Chile, Liebherr Chile, with assist from Liebherr’s truck manufacturing facility in Newport Information, Virginia, USA. To scale back downtime, the retrofit course of was accomplished in levels. First, modifications have been made to the vehicles’ superstructures so as to make them trolley prepared. Then, when development of the trolley infrastructure was starting to wrap up, technicians from Liebherr Chile fitted the pantographs to the truck.
Complete, enduring assist
Liebherr has supplied intensive coaching to Collahuasi’s truck operators to make sure the trolley line is used to its most potential.
Now that Collahuasi has assumed operational management of the trolley line, Liebherr will proceed to assist mine employees with further coaching and also will present technical experience when wanted.
“This challenge is a transparent instance of what’s attainable by way of strategic partnership”, Weiss says. “We look ahead to seeing the long-term outcomes and hopefully increasing Liebherr’s trolley footprint sooner or later.”
Learn the article on-line at: https://www.globalminingreview.com/mining/30072025/liebherr-delivers-complete-trolley-solution-at-collahuasi-mine/