RCR commissions MUP at Iluka’s Kulwin site

In 2007, RCR Engineering presented a concept for a track-mounted, mobile mining unit plant (MUP), incorporating several of its existing products, to Iluka Resources for the latter’s new mining operation at Kulwin for the Murray Basin Stage 2 Project in Victoria.

Iluka has utilised RCR mining equipment extensively over the past 25 years, traditionally designed as fixed plant or semi mobile applications.

However, mining this mineral sands project required a different approach, as the deposit is set in a strike zone which is both narrow and long. If the traditional approach had been adopted, ore would have been required to be transported a long distance by diesel powered earth moving equipment, a costly and environmentally damaging approach. It was in response to this that RCR Engineering’s Bunbury operations developed the MUP.

RCR is well known as an original equipment manufacturer (OEM) of heavy mining and materials handling equipment such as apron feeders, scrubbers and trommels. These items are often designed and manufactured then installed as fixed plant or as part of semi demountable structures.

The Iluka project required a highly mobile, low operational cost solution to the relocation process. Given the mining technique required full plant relocation every five to six days and 24 hour operation, it was necessary to develop not only a self contained mobile platform, but also mechanisms which would allow the ease of positioning and interface in an optimum period.

The mining profile for the Kulwin project meant that the strand of high mineral bearing ore is a narrow cross section but stretches up to 15km in length. The principles of mining this ore body encouraged RCR to utilise three modules of track mounted plant. All modules are required to interface or dock together for operation.

Traditional minerals sand mining often requires large transport corridors utilising volume transport to a central recovery plant. The equipment moves with the mining plant and delivers the screened material suspended in slurry form, to the mineral separation plant.

RCR Engineering’s Bunbury operations went back to basics and developed a transport mechanism for the proven operational principles of the existing RCR equipment range.

The MUP was developed as a fully mobile ore recovery, screening and processing facility, designed to fit Iluka’s particular application.

Separated into three main track-mounted modules, the design incorporates an apron feeder with dozer trap and primary screen on the first module, a rotating autogenous scrubber on the second module and rotating scrubber/trommel screen and oversize conveyors on module three.

All three modules work together, passing ore through RCR’s traditional materials handling equipment. The modules are housed in specially designed superstructures that are built on customised track systems and operated by remote control.

The MUP is a monumental structure. With all three modules docked together, it weighs 1100 tonnes and measures 120 metres end to end – longer than a Boeing 747.

From initial concept to practical completion, the project took 21 months, fitting into the project time line for the Iluka Kulwin mine site development.

“The key to success was goal-focused, co-operative management and liaison between the major stakeholders – Iluka, Clough Projects for EPCM and RCR Engineering,” said Ian Gibbs, operations manager at RCR Engineering Bunbury. “During this whole period, RCR achieved a spotless safety record.”

Design

RCR Engineering’s in house design team in Bunbury determined the operational requirements and limitations. It used 3D drafting and FEA design to incorporate hydraulic and mechanical techniques in the plant which would overcome the mobility limitations.

The Bunbury design team, headed by Ben Pope, worked through the required operational requirements of each piece of the primary equipment – apron feeder, scrubbing plant and screening trommel – to identify the potential limitations of a mobile plant.

Key design elements of the MUP are that it:

• Is highly mobile, moving

• every five to six days

• Incorporate the maintenance aspects of a fixed plant to allow maintenance activities to be conducted in a minimum time window

• Is capable of operating on the mine pit floor

• Is able to traverse up to 7% gradients with 1,000 tonnes of equipment on board

• Provide the processing capacity of a traditionally fixed plant application

Manufacture of three modules

The mining unit consists of three separable modules: the apron feeder, the scrubber and the trommel. Each of the units has a hydraulic power pack to enable movement control when the mining units are disconnected from the mains electrical power, typically during a move.

The hydraulics are controlled manually by an operator via remote radio control devices which are received by local radio control modules. The manual and remote functions are mutually exclusive and are selected from each local control panel.

If required, under certain conditions, the middle unit can be completely removed from the chain, allowing module one to connect directly to module three.

Installation and commissioning

After successful initial assembly at RCR Engineering’s lay down yard in Bunbury, the company disassembled and transported the three modules separately and installed them at Iluka’s Kulwin site in Victoria. This was a major logistical exercise utilizing a huge fleet of trucks.

RCR successfully commissioned the project in October 2009. A full mechanical and electrical fit up was completed at the Bunbury works site prior to the 3,500km journey to site. Now operating under full production at Kulwin, the top soil is replaced as the MUP moves on to the next section, returning the site to its original purpose as farmland.

Demand for more MUPs

Increasingly, mining operations require conventional mining equipment to be easily relocatable. At the same time, modular plant is being preferred as it minimises site construction times and easily enables relocation.

“RCR’s MUP provides an innovative and unique engineering solution, which can be applied to all manner of minerals,” said Ben Pope, design engineer, RCR Engineering. “The uniqueness of the MUP concept will become an industry benchmark in the mineral sands industry, delivering new levels of efficiency, cost benefits and increased production to the end user.”

Future

The huge success of the MUP resulted in RCR being commissioned by Iluka for a definitive feasibility study and detailed design of a second unit. At time of print, design and manufacture of this second unit is now complete and commissioning is well underway.

Instead of being designed as three separate units like the MUP, the requirements of Iluka’s new ore body at the Jacinth Ambrosia site in South Australia have dictated that the second project is all housed in one single unit. As expected, the size of this second unit is impressive. Weighing in at around 900 tonnes, it measures 33 metres long, 18 metres wide and stands 18 metres high.

Contact: RCR Engineering Bunbury, tel (08) 9726 4555,
email: buneng@rcrtom.com.au