Modelling of In-Pit Crusher Conveyor

alternatives
J. G. Londoño, P. F. Knights* and M. S. Kizil

As open cut mines become progressively deeper, mining operations face increased operating
costs and technical challenges. In-Pit Crusher Conveyor (IPCC) systems offer advantages in the
form of continuous operation, reduced labour requirements and decreased energy consumption
resulting in lower cost per bank cubic metre. Nevertheless, IPCC systems are associated with
high capital costs, lack of flexibility to adapt to changing mine plans and low effective system
utilisation. This paper investigates alternative IPCC configurations for pre-stripping application in
an open pit coal mine. It demonstrates that system redundancy in the form of introducing parallel
conveyor lines with spreaders is capable of improving IPCC productivity by 9-4-12-6%. Parallel
conveying systems have higher Equivalent Unit Costs (EUCs) than do single conveyor IPCC
configurations. Nevertheless, introducing redundancy into IPCC systems enables higher
production and associated coal revenue. Using an indicative metallurgical coal price and
stripping ratio, it was demonstrated that parallel conveyor IPCC systems can provide higher profit
than single conveyor line IPCC alternatives.
Keywords: In-pit crusher conveyor, Reliability model, Effective utilisation. Belt conveyor

Introduction and maintenance data were collected from several

The mining industry is facing many environmental and
productivity challenges related to operating large surface
mines. Truck haulage can account for approximately
40% of the total mining costs in a surface coal mine
(Koehler, 2003). In-Pit Crusher Conveyor (IPCC)
systems offer continuous operation, reduced labour
requirements and energy consumption, resulting in
lower cost per bank cubic metre (bcm) (Moore, 2010).
In certain situations, higher capital investment of IPCC
systems can be offset against lower operating costs to
become more cost effective over time than truck/shovel
haulage systems. Figure 1 shows an IPCC system in a
coal operation that was supplied to Yimin Hi in
Northern China.
Savings as a result of reduced operating costs rely on
systems performance. For instance: if the IPCC does not
function as expected and productivity targets are not
achieved, higher unit costs will result. This study
investigates the feasibility of alternative configurations
of an IPCC prestripping operation in an open cut coal
mine. An IPCC system must deliver high system
reliability, availability and effective utilisation in order
to deliver high productivity and low cost operation. To
evaluate this, a reliability block model was constructed
to simulate the system's operation and determine the
system's effective utilisation and production. Operating
School of Mechanical and Mining Engineering, The University of
Queensland, and CRC Mining, Brisbane, Qld, Australia
•Corresponding author, email p.knights@uq.edu.au
sources, including failure distributions from similar
mining equipment and utilisation information from a
mine in central Queensland.
The system studied comprises an IPCC system with
parallel belt conveyors and stacker/spreaders linked to a
hopper/crusher and a walking dragline retrofitted with
Universal Dig and Dump (UDD) technology. This sys-
tem is known as a 'Dragline/Hopper/Crusher/Conveyor'
(DHCC) system. The productivity of the system is
driven by the operation of the UDD Dragline interfaced
with a mobile hopper and crusher (sizer) station. Hence,
a simulation is carried out utilising '3D-Dig' dragline
simulation software to determine the optimal location of
the hopper/crusher station relative to the dragline. It
subsequently determines whether it is feasible to apply a
parallel conveyor belt and stacker arrangement with the
DHCC system for prestripping applications.
Dragline and IPCC overview
The material handling system under study is based on
previous investigations involving similar equipment
utilised in open cut coal mines for prestripping opera-
tions. The system configuration comprises of: a walking
dragline, a mobile receiving hopper and crushing
station, belt conveyors, a tripper car and spreader,
known as a DHCC system. The present study extends
existing analyses by equipping the DHCC system with a
parallel belt conveyor system and spreader arrangement,
and a walking dragline fitted with UDD technology.
DHCC systems were widely investigated in the mid
1980s and early 1990s as evident from several studies

® 2013 Institute of Materials, Minerals and Mining and The AusIMM

Published by Maney on behalf of the Institute and The AusIMM
Received 13 May 2013; accepted 2 September 2013
DOl 10.1179/1743286313Y.0000000048 Mining Technology 2013 VOL 122 NO 4 193
Londoño étal. Modelling of IPCC alternatives
1 Fully mobile crusher, bridge conveyor, belt wagon and
bench conveyor supplied to Yimin He, Northern China
(Harcus, 2011)
carried out by the Australian Coal Association Research
Program (The Shell Company of Australia & CSR
Limited, 1990). Mountain States Mineral Enterprises
Inc. carried out an evaluation of several DH systems in
the USA. The 'DHCC System conceptual study and
capital cost estimate' project assessed the feasibility of a
conventional dragline feeding a crusher conveyor system
(The Shell Company of Australia Limited, 1991). Poor
productivity resulting from the need to continually
relocate the hopper to effect dumping from a conven-
tional dragline resulted in the project being abandoned.
UDD dragline
A major dragline innovation occurred in the mid to late
1990s with the introduction of UDD technology (Jones,
2007). UDD technology has successfully been retrofitted
to six machines in Australia. Developed by the
Cooperative Research Centre for Mining in Australia,
UDD draglines overcome the digging and dumping
constraints of conventional rigged draglines by fitting
independent ropes to the front and back of a dragline
bucket, controlled via a split hoist drum and motor
arrangement. As a result of eliminating the weight of a
conventional bucket's jewellery, larger capacity buckets
are able to be fitted to UDD machines. A modification
of the boom point sheave arrangement is also necessary
whereby the conventional parallel sheave arrangement is
replaced with an inline arrangement. UDD draglines are
able to pick up and dump a bucket at any radius up to
and including the maximum operating radius of the
boom. The combination of increased payload and
reduced filling distances and subsequent cycle times
enable significant dragline productivity increases.
Since UDD technology allows the dragline to dump
the bucket at positions within the dragline operating
radius, the hopper/crusher does not have to be relocated
every time the dragline is moved. This extends the
periods of operation between the dragline and Hopper/
Crusher movements, potentially increasing system
productivity.
Parallel belt conveyors
The second innovation in this study is consideration of
parallel conveyor and spreader configurations in DHCC
systems. This aspect was considered as it provides higher
systems reliability and facilitates the planning of
operations in open cut coal mines. A reliability model
of the system was constructed in order to simulate the
potential productive performance of DHCC system. A
review was conducted of open literature related to
reliability models developed for continuous material
handling systems. Suprakash and Jay anta (2006) devel-
oped a reliability model for an armoured face conveyor
in an underground longwall mine for Singareni
Collieries Company Limited in India. Suprakash and
Uday followed up this study in 2010 by developing a
194 Mining Technology 2013 VOL122 NO 4
reliability model for the main gate belt conveyor system
transporting coal away from a longwall face. A fault tree
diagram was constructed by dividing the system into
manageable components in order to understand the
failure logic of the system.
Reliability models incorporating redundant systems in
mining applications have been modelled in the past.
Levitin et al. (1996) analysed redundant systems alter-
natives for conveyor systems supplying a power station.
Their paper proposed a procedure to determine the
minimal cost of series/parallel configurations.
Modelling parallel conveyors in DHCC
systems
This study considers a multiseam open cut coal mining
operation located in Central Queensland, Australia. The
mine consists of three coal seams referred to as the
lower, middle and upper seams. The mine includes
several pits which are mined using a combination of
truck and shovel methods for prestripping of the upper
seam and interburden removal from the middle seam,
and draglines for the lower seam. Draglines are
employed on the lower seam because the interburden
material can be moved to its final destination.
The focus for modelling the DHCC system with
parallel conveyors and spreaders is for potential
application to prestripping operations in the mine's
three northern pits. The northern pits are facing issues
related to increasing pit depth, increasing waste volumes
and increasing truck cycle times. The major components
of the DHCC systems are as follows:
(i) a modified Marion 8050 dragline fitted with
UDD technology with a rated suspended load
of 134 t, equivalent to 48 bcm of overburden
(ii) a fully mobile crusher equipped with a receiving
hopper, an apron feeder, twin shaft sizer,
transfer and discharge conveyor and crawler
track with a maximum capacity of 10 000 t h~'
(iii) a parallel belt conveyor system with a combined
maximum capacity of 8000 t h~'
(iv) two crawler mounted tripper cars and sprea-
ders.
DHCC options for the Northern Pits
DHCC options for the northern pits were identified by
considering typical excavation blocks, spoil dump
locations, conveyor routes and interaction between the
DHCC with other pit processes. A DHCC option was
identified for Northern Pits 1 and 2, and two possible
DHCC options were identified for the Northern Pit 3 as
there is an additional spoil dump option (Fig. 2). The
respective DHCC options are as follows: Option 1 is
essentially the same for both first and second northern
pits as they use the same spoil dump locations (A and B).
These locations represent the shortest distances from the
prestrip operation to the spoil dump area. For the third
pit, this option is similar; however, the distance to the
spoil dump location is longer as this is the furthest pit.
To visualise one of the configurations, the DHCC
option in the Northern Pit 1 is illustrated. The shaded
orange areas represent possible spoil dump locations;
the green areas represents the spoil dump zones of the
DHCC system; the red lines depict the belt conveyors
and yellow and blue points represent the dragline and
the fully mobile crusher plant respectively. The belt

2 DHCC system for first northern pit (source: Google
Maps)
conveyors sections are named 'CV for the first line and
'CVP' for the parallel route.
Dragline/hopper dumping simulation
The study focused on the evaluation of three alternatives
for locating the hopper/crusher relative to the dragline.
These include: low wall dumping with the hopper
located in advance of the pit; in-pit hopper dumping;
and high wall hopper dumping. Simulations were
developed using the '3D-Dig' software package to
analyse these alternatives. The option capable of
providing the highest productivity was found to be the
in-pit hopper alternative.
This alternative involves locating the dragline on the
surface of the working bench with an IPCC system in-
pit. The crusher is positioned in order to minimise
relocations, and is essentially limited to linear move-
ments along the strike of the pit. Figure 3 illustrates the
proposed excavation sequence for a block. The dragline
sits on the highwall and excavates subblock 1, swinging
in an anticlockwise direction to dump material into the
hopper. Once subblock 1 has been excavated, the
dragline moves back off the highwall to position itself
for excavating subblock 2, The hopper is repositioned to
the toe of the next block, and the dragline begins to
dump in a clockwise sense into the hopper.
The hopper/crusher moves along the strike of the pit
discharging material into the conveyor system. As the
system is intended for application to prestripping of the
upper seam, there is limited interaction with other truck-
shovel operations, 3D-Dig simulations were carried out
for three overburden bench depths: 30, 40 and 50 m
respectively. The simulations enabled determination of:
average walking times; average swing angles; average
cycle time; dig time; and volume excavated per dig hour.
The 30 m alternative was determined to provide the
highest productivity based on adequate reach of the
dragline to the hopper. This bench depth was used in
subsequent DHCC productivity scenarios.
Dragline btock characteristics
Several block configurations were simulated for each
depth alternative. The best configuration was deter-
mined by considering the maximum reach of the
dragline to the hopper. The excavation block was
determined to be of 60 m width by 30 m length and
30 m depth. The block was divided into two subblocks:
(i) subblock 1, of 35 m width and 30 m length close
to the edge of the total block
Londoño et al. Modelling of IPCC alternatives
3 Overburden excavation of subbtock 1 showing in-pit
hopper location
(ii) subblock 2, of 25 m width and 30 m length
nearer the highwall.
Dragline walk times
The simulation results provide the dragline walking
distances every time the machine moves as well as the
walking speed (Table 1), It is estimated that the dragline
would require an average of 25 min to walk from the
completion of subblock 1 to begin excavating subblock
2, The hopper/crusher has to be capable of being
relocated within this time in order not to affect dragline
productivity. After the dragline completes subblock 2, it
requires only 12 min to relocate to subblock 1, The
hopper/crusher station remains stationary throughout
this move.
Dragline swing angles
The advantage of in-pit hopper dumping is that the
dragline can achieve high productivity by maintaining
relatively short swing angles. In addition, the dragline
operator is afforded with good visibility in order to
ensure consistent hopper dumping and minimise the risk
of collision with the bucket. The average dragline swing
angle when excavating the subblock 1 was found to be
22°, The average swing angle for subblock 2 was found
to be 26°,
Reliability modelling of IPCC alternatives
In order to model the systems reliability of parallel
conveyors in IPCC systems, aspects such as the number
of conveyor sections; length of conveyors and direction
need to be defined. The following conveyor options were
considered:
(i) parallel conveyors for an IPCC in Northern Pit 1
(ii) parallel conveyors for an IPCC in Northern Pit 2
(iii) parallel conveyors for an IPCC in Northern Pit
3, Options 1 and 2,
The parallel conveying configurations for Northern Pit
1, 2 and 3 (Option 1) each require four conveyor
segments in each parallel route. Transfer points were
modelled as major sources of downtime however
Mining Technology 2013 VOL122 NO 4 195
Lot^doño et al. Modelling of IPCC alternatives
conveyor segment distance was assumed not to affect
reliability. A second reliability model was established for
the Northern Pit 3 (Option 2), which considered four
mo conveyors in one route and five in the other.
E " -- o
o S ^ _o
CD o ^
m System losses
c u o Z3 Figure 4 illustrates a simplified time accounting system.
*= _g ^
.^ .Q .a CO CO CO o - ^ n System availability (sometimes called system physical
LÔ '=¿1' LO LÓ L Ó rö 8-Q
CM CM CM CM Cvl availability) is defined by the ratio of available time
to scheduled calendar time. Availability losses include
scheduled and unscheduled maintenance losses.
Scheduled maintenance delays include preventive main-
^ tenance, inspections and scheduled component change-
outs. Unscheduled delays are cause by system defects
g) CD - ^ - o CT) CTl o o
b LÓ LÓ b O> CO CO Ó) C3) resulting in the failure of components. A WeibuU
distribution is often employed to model the time
between successive failures. This is because the distribu-
tion is capable of emulating constant, decreasing or
o increasing failure rates dependent on the value of its two
>.
u Ü
(V principal parameters, the shape factor ß and the
CD
CO Cfl characteristic life ri.
m "25
^1 System utilisation is defined as the ratio of utilised
time over available time. Effective utilisation is the
product of system utilisation and system availability.
•D
Utilisation losses are composed of both scheduled and
c
o o unscheduled process losses. These time losses have been
o
d)
E J«
^
(B CD taken from a typical IPCC operating times as measured
2 E -" by Harcus (2011). The percentage allocated for each
CO CO r ^ cp lo ! o <J CO ^ O)
ô cô ci) ô LÓ ^ s cb CÖ cb CÍ> cb
operating delay represents the percentage of the calendar
o ^ C\J CM ti^
CO CO CO CO CO r n ^ CD I-- h - time when the system is not functioning (i.e. loss of
CO CO CO CO CO .— 3 ( ^ h^ r— CO CO
T3 o CO CO CO effective utilisation). The allocated process delays are as
follows:
(i) weather/storms or fog: 3%
EI (ii) not manned: 1%
(iii) safety training: 1%
LO C p O ) CO > o
(iv) meal break: 2%
<ü
73 o -^ o -^ (v) shift change: 3%
2 =5 Ü
(vi) conveyor relocations: 1%
(vii) wait IPCC: 1%
(viii) fuelling/checks: 2%
=5 E (ix) cable positioning: 2%
0) u -•- -^ o CM ,- CM - r - CM -îf
E ó 'à" 1^ 0^ irj (x) equipment positioning: 6%
il
CM LÓ ó CJ!
en o o -^ o - ^ m CD CO
S CO
CO
Œ)
CD
O)
c^
O)
CO
05
n
o o
> x;
O O O O (xi) wait dozer/clean up: 3%.
<N Total time losses sum to 25% of calendar time. This
O
O
value was used to represent process delays in each
n G)
reliability model.
C To analyse the systems reliability of parallel conveyors
CD o
in IPCC systems, the Isograph Availability Workbench
E (AWB) software package (supplied by ARMS reliabil-
to
CM o "5) ( D - ^ C\J O ) CM
fc CO CD CO o ity) was utilised. This software enables reliability block
i < models to be constructed of different IPCC system
configurations.
I
(fl
Cvl
o
Figure 5 shows the reliability configuration of the
£ c parallel IPCC system for the first, second and third pits
i3 n (Option 1). Each block defines a component of the
o CO
(A
(D .E CD c
system. As an example, the first block on the left is the
II CO ^
dragline followed by the fully mobile crusher station.
The two belt conveyor lines represent redundancy in the
'm
II
CO CO o N - CO - ^ N . CO CO O)
-T^ - - ^ CM -V^ - ^ CM - ^ -v^ --^ ^
Io system. Further development of the reliability block
diagrams enables a fault tree diagram to be constructed
iS
D for the primary failure events of each component block
0) (mechanical, electrical, instrument failure, etc.) The
B Ol
O software enables the influence of these primary events
ë O to be modelled across entire system.
m
196 Mining Technology 2013 VOL122 NO 4
 Londoño et al. Modelling of IPCC alternatives

Scheduled calendar hours

Scheduled ! Unscheduled i
Available hours maintenance maintenance '
losses losses j

rScheduleTI Unscheduled
Utilised hours process | process
1 losses 1 losses

4 Simplified time accounting model

CVl (Parallel CV2 (Parallel CVB (Parallel CV4 (Parallel Spreader [

corivevor 1) conveyor 2) conveyor 3) conveyor 4) 2)

5 Reiiabiiity model for Northern Pit Option 1

Estimation of WeibuU parameters Utilisation and production of the DHCC system utilising
The parameters defining the Weibull failure distribu- a parallel conveyor was compared to that with single
tions for the eonveyor and spreader were estimated from belt conveyor line.
similar conveyor and spreader equipment operating in a
heap leaching operation in Chile (Madariaga and DHCC Alternatives comparison
Pascual, 2011). The resulting Weibull parameters of
each component are summarised in Table 2. It is Single line [5 Conveyors) ^ |
acknowledged that the size distribution and bulk density
of crushed copper ore may differ from the sized coal Single line (4 Conveyors ) H|

overburden considered in this study, and that this may Singleline (3 Conveyors) HI • MIn
affect resultant failure parameters. A sensitivity analysis
• Ave
was run using the AWB software to assess the suitability Paralle lines (4 CV. 5 parallel CV) •
• Max
of the failure parameters.
Paralle lines (3 CV. 4 Parallel CV) Él

Results 40 45 50 55 60 65
Utilisation
One hundred simulations were run in order to obtain
accurate values over 1 year. The predicted effective 6 DHCC alternatives effection utiiisation comparison

Tabie 2 Primary event parameters (conveyor and spreader data from Madariaga and Pascual, 2011)

IPCC System Weibull parameters

Beta Eta (h)

ß V

IPCC component Primary events Form factor Scale factor MTTR (h)

Belt conveyor Conveyor takeup 0-48 36-99 0-3

Conveyor electrical 0-7 31-04 0-6
Conveyor mechanical 0-64 50-96 1-0
Spreader Spreader mechanical 0-5 72-97 1-0
Spreader crawler 0-47 236-77 0-3
Spreader hydraulic 0-66 307-32 0-7
Spreader electrical 0-47 39-45 0-7
Crusher Crusher failure 1 18-7 2-0
Dragline Dragline failure 1 13-5 3-0
Lognormal parameters
/i/h (T/h
Mean Standard deviation
Process delays 6-9 5-5 1-0

Mining Technology 2013 VOL 122 NO 4 197

Londoño et ai Modelling of IPCC alternatives

Calendar .
¿Hours i

Scheduled & tJnshceduted

Maintenance Time

7 DHCC economic model

Effective utilisation results for the IPCC alternatives
are shown in Fig. 6. The respective minimum, average
and maximum values are shown. It can be seen that the
use of redundant parallel conveyors increases effective
system utilisation by 9-4-12-6%, dependent on the
selected base case.
The UDD dragline productivity was taken into
account to estimate the productivity of the entire system.
Operating and capital costs were based on IPCC
equipment such as crushing plant, belt conveyors, tripper
car and spreader. Figure 7 shows the economic variables
used to estimate system capital and operating costs.

EUC COMPARISON

g PARALLEL-4PCV&5CV/20.6 Km

.» SINGLE-5CV/11.1 Km

J PARALLEL-3PCV&4CV/14.6Km I Maximum Utilisation

lAverage Utilisatioii
SINGLE-4CV/7.6 Km
I Minimum Utilisation

SHMGLE-3CV/7Km

1.00 1.10 1.20 1.30 1.40 1.50 1.60 1.70 1.80

$/ Overburden Tonne
8 EUC comparison of iPCC configurations

198 Mining Technology 2013 VOL122 NO 4


Overburden Value -10 years
Ov*rbufd«n
12 5
valu*. S/t
• Single Conveyors
Parallel Conveyors
1.22
180 200 220 240 260
Overburden Production (Mt)
9 DHCC alternatives value comparison
An Equivalent Unit Cost (EUC) model was used to
compare the economic performance of system alter-
natives. This is calculated by dividing Net Present Cost
by the Net Present Production, considering a ten year
operating horizon. EUC evaluation is commonly used
by a number of major mining houses, as prestrip
production is a proxy variable to represent the value
add of exposed coal.
A total of five IPCC system configurations were
analysed. Three system configurations correspond to
single conveying systems, while two alternatives are
parallel conveying systems. Figure 8 summarises the
EUC of the IPCC alternatives.
Discussion
The IPCC configurations having single conveyor lines
have lower associated EUC than their parallel conveyor
alternatives. Mining companies might be tempted to
select these lower cost alternatives. However, designing
in system redundancy in the form of parallel conveyor
and stacker significantly enhances the productive cap-
ability of the DHCC system. A more appropriate means
of comparison is via the value potential of both systems.
Assuming a metallurgical coal price of A$100/t, and an
overburden stripping ratio of 8:1, The value-add for
stripping overburden is therefore $12-50/t.
Figure 9 shows a comparison between the most cost
effective single IPCC alternative (three conveyors) and
its competing parallel configuration. The single con-
veyor line IPCC option produces 203 Mt of overburden
over a 10-year period at an EUC of Sl-22/t. Conversely,
the parallel alternative produces 240 Mt at an EUC of
$l-39/t. The blue underlined area represents the value
Londoño et al. Modelling of IPCC alternatives
provided by the single conveyors alternative, whereas
the red underlined area shows the value of parallel
conveyors. The parallel IPCC configuration is capable of
providing AS376m additional value over the single
conveyor system. It is recommended that a sensitivity
analysis be undertaken of the impact of increasing coal
extraction rates on the life of the mine. If the increased
extraction rates coincide with periods of high coal prices,
net present value is more likely to be favourably
affected.
Conclusions
This paper has evaluated the use of parallel conveying
alternatives for IPCC systems for overburden removal
applications in open cut mines. It has demonstrated that
a parallel conveyor and spreader configuration is
capable of improving systems productivity by 9-4--
12-6%. An economic model was developed for both
single and parallel conveying configurations. Parallel
conveying systems have higher EUCs than do single
conveyor configurations. The parallel configuration with
three and four conveyors costs A$0-17/t more than a
single configuration with three conveyors. Nevertheless,
introducing redundancy into IPCC systems enables
higher production and associated revenue. Using an
indicative metallurgical coal process and stripping ratio,
it was demonstrated that parallel conveyor IPCC
systems can provide a higher profit alternative to mining
operations than single IPCC alternatives.
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