Efficient solution for longer, high-performance overland conveyors. ThyssenKrupp Robins, Colorado/USA, has received a further order from Xstrata Copper to supply an overland conveying system for the Peruvian Las Bambas copper mine. This will be the second ThyssenKrupp gearless drive overland belt conveyor in Peru and sees a continuation of the company’s successful cooperation with Siemens, which supplies the gearless drive. The first system of this kind for the Antapaccay copper mine began commercial operations in November 2012.
Each of two new overland conveyors at Xstrata’s Las Bambas copper mine will be approximately 2.5 kilometers long and transport ore from the mine to the processing plant. The belts will be 1,830 millimeters wide, travel at 6.5 meters per second, and are designed to transport approximately 9,400 metric tons of material per hour. Start-up of the new Las Bambas conveyor system is scheduled for 2014.
The Siemens drive systems for each of the two overland conveyors are comprised of two slow-speed synchronous motors – each with a total power of 4,400 kilowatts – and the associated Sinamics SL150 cycloconverters.
This gearless drive solution has a number of advantages over the combination of high speed motor and gearbox drives usually used on conveyor systems. The size of the motor is not limited by the size of gearbox available, thus eliminating the necessity to install multi-motor drives. The power required to drive a belt can be provided by just one drive per belt pulley. This enables the footprint for the drive and the size of the electrical room to be reduced, saving space and weight.
The elimination of a whole series of mechanical and electrical components increases the reliability and efficiency of the overall system by between three and four percent. Using gearless drives instead of standard motor-reducer packages will eliminate approximately 40 bearings and 8 couplings per conveyor.
The maintenance requirements of the drive system are also substantially lower. Gearbox maintenance work alone can amount to up to five percent of the original investment cost – each year. Lubrication and gearbox cooling systems, together with their maintenance, are also eliminated for this solution.
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Part of Xstrata plc, Xstrata Copper is headquartered in Brisbane, Australia, and runs mines and production plants in Argentina, Australia, Chile, Canada and Peru. The company is the fourth largest copper producer in the world. The Las Bambas copper mine in the south of Peru is scheduled to produce some 400,000 tons of copper in concentrate per annum from 2015.
ThyssenKrupp Robins is the US subsidiary of ThyssenKrupp Fördertechnik. The company specializes in the design and supply of technologically advanced conveyor applications.