Real-time understanding of your operation enables you to make decisions that impact the outcome now, when it will have the greatest impact. Actions taken at the face have a multiplier effect on downstream operations – maximising payload from the face minimises lost opportunities in the form of spare and/or idle capacity elsewhere. Real-time understanding of your payload is the cornerstone to an optimised operation – Monitor, Manage, Optimise.
Traditional payload management has been achieved through a combination of truck counting, weighbridges and regular survey reconciliation. A good operation can get the margin of error down below 10% between their estimate and month-end reconciliation – by which time it is too late to make any effective operational change. Our team has spent years streamlining real-time payload solutions to accuracy within 3%. The outcome is immediate data to drive effective action.
Understanding your payload can be achieved two ways, measuring ore in the bucket or in the truck bed. Getting data from as close to the face argues for a bucket led solution, but there are times when this is not practical and a truck-based solution is preferred – this is typically driven by the number and type of equipment you already have deployed and whether it is an underground or open-pit environment.
Bucket based – Ramjack’s payload solution involves installing instruments to measure a prime mover’s bucket position and hydraulic pressure. Understanding these variables provides an accurate understanding of what is in the bucket before it is loaded into the truck.
Truck based – Ramjack’s truck-based payload solution involves installing load cells on your fleet to provide an accurate understanding of what is loaded before the truck moves off.
Either solution is fit for both the underground or open-pit environment, although Ramjack would generally recommend our bucket based solution as it provides a clearer understanding of your face operations coupled with potential future upgrades beyond payload:
- Prevents under/over loading of trucks;
- Enables operator performance analysis to drive improved training;
- Upgrade to shovel guidance to prevent under/over digging – dig to plan;
- Upgrade to shovel guidance to drive grade control.
Ramjack’s solutions enable an operation to integrate into existing fleet management systems and/or can operate on a standalone basis. For an operation starting a journey to embrace new technology, a payload monitoring solution is a good option to consider – as the driver of data that impacts on the decision-making process further down the value chain.
As a systems integrator, Ramjack is well versed in understanding the challenges that face our clients; through this understanding we are able to provide guidance as to possible solutions that maximise the return on investment – the greatest driver to any implementation.
