Quality and safety are being used in tandem to foster a culture of
getting it right first time Managing the 2 973 mining-division
personnel and assuring safety and quality on sites are the
functions of new manager mining Johan Lubbe, who has taken over
from Mike Bevan, now manager marketing. The mining division’s
attainment of the International Standards Organisation 9001
accreditation and the National Occupational Safety Association
system are being used in tandem to introduce a new working culture
which has already borne fruit on the safety front.
For instance, a record 600 000 fatality-free shifts have been
achieved on the triple-decline contract at Joel mine; the deepest
ventilation shaft ever sunk fatality-free by the company is on the
South Deep contract; and there has been only a single minor
accident seven months into the sinking of the main South Deep
shaft, a good record in verticals. A byproduct, Lubbe reports, is
the minimisingsmall portable gravel crusher in india of rework, through the emphasis of zero
defect.
“In the mining industry, it is said that there always seems
to be time to fix a job but never enough time to do it right the
first time, and we are reversing this notion,” says Lubbe,
who currently has 13 master sinkers in the field on as many
sites.
At Joel’s Taung North shaft project, the company is in the
throes of creating infrastructure on 110 level to raisebore a
vertical lift shaft down to 121 level, through which rock will be
hoisted for tipping on to a belt-conveying system, linked to the
triple decline.
The projects collectivcs crusher parts manualely shorten the time to commence production
and are key to reducing working costs at Joel.
Taung North, where equipping will begin in mid-2000, will be fully
operational in two years.
At the 5,5 km strike Bafokeng Rasimone platinum mine, two
infrastructural systems have declines at 14€, the materials
system with winder to rail-transport material and the
personnel-transporting system a belt conveyor.
Work is roughly at the halfway mark, having reached level three on
the way to a maximum depth to 270 m over an incline distance of 700
m. Though the R262-million 52-week Kroondal project is the largest
project by value, Joel and South skull crushers or beatsDeep are largest operationally,
says Lubbe.
The company is now at 39 level at Beatrix 3 ventilation shaft in
the Free State, where development is under way prior to sinking to
40 and 41 levels – an additional 310 m adding R30-million to
Cementation Mining’s contract.
Lubbe reports that the slowdown in the mining industry is making
recruitment of top experienced personnel easy.
He says the task-orientated and multiskilled culture of
shaftsinkers makes them an ideal workforce for the fast-expanding
contract-mining business.
For that reason, all Cementation Mining’s remuneration
packages are structured around bonus systems. So far 12 panels have
been opened at Kroondal Platinum Mine and the focus is to sink the
declines as fast as possible, with a new panel being opened every
10 m descended.
The 115 900 t a month is scheduled to be achieved by January
2000.
A change of layout has taken place at Kroondal as a result of
weathered ground below the crown pillar.
Following the fracturing of the leg of a miner, it was decided to
reduce the width of the excavations drastically from 10 m to 4 m to
stabilise the area.
The pillar sizes were also increased in size from 5 m by 5 m to 6 m
by 6 m.
This had a major influence on the production cycle, reducing the
expected 136 t per 10 m face to 40% of that.
This resulted in twice as many blasts having to take place to
achieve the required tonnage.
Blasting has also begun on Kroondal east, where conditions are
vastly different.
The ground is dry and there is a firm hangingwall, as originally
envisaged.
A 20 m-thick dyke running through the east mine will be approached
from a more acute angle, with the area parallel to it being mined
for the first 250 m before breaching the dyke.
This will result in a structural change to the belt conveyor
system, but without affecting the pace of mining.
Cementation Mining is placing much store on Kroondal as it expects
success there to be an open sesame for contract mining in other
underground mines, including established ones.
It has been focusing on some large ones, not the least being
Anglogold’s Western Deep Levels, where it has completed a
transport-belt development ahead of schedule and where it is
bidding on ore-pass lining and development work on 109 level.
Having completed this with six days to spare, Cementation is keen
to expand its activities, especially at South shaft, the Mponeng
mine, where subshaft deepening is being undertaken.
Cementation Mining is offering its services to the mine in the form
of shaft-sinking and development of large excavations, but even
more so in contract mining.
So the contract mining revolution is at hand and the bids are going
in daily.