Austin Engineering has declared a Liebherr R9800 and Komatsu 930E-5 dump truck combination as the most efficient truck/excavator pairing.
The mining industry is encouraged to learn more about payload matching around achieving lowest cost per tonne to match an excavator to a truck.
Anecdotal research revealed that this is not well understood within the mining industry.
Austin Engineering stated that buying the right equipment package – loading tool and dump bodies – was vital.
History has shown that the bigger capital expenditure up front, the better return on that investment, particularly around reliability and availability, according to the designer and manufacturer of customised dump truck bodies and excavator buckets.
“The loading tool comes first, followed by the dump trucks. And ironically, depending on the equipment package, that could be the start of issues of reduced load and haul productivity,” Austin Engineering stated.
According to Austin Engineering global manager market development & innovation, David Pichanick, the most efficient bucket, excavator and truck combination in Australia at the moment is a Liebherr R9800 three-pass loading Komatsu 930E-5 dump trucks, fitted with Austin’s Ultima bodies.
“We were asked to provide the truck bodies,” Pichanick said.
“The customer didn’t want the excavator/truck combination suggested by either supplier but purchased the equipment package they believe will maximise the return – in terms of performance, availability and reliability – over the longer term.
“Our bodies were custom built to fit the trucks and complement the capabilities of the excavator. The load and haul tonnages they are generating confirm the buying decision.”
Using the 10/10/20 rule – a reliable reference for truck payloads that recognises that variations occur in specific gravity (SG), fill factors and loading equipment – and the latest loading tools, this technology measures payload per pass and lets loading tool operators see if the SG is changing, a much safer system than waiting until the load is on the truck.