Thank you to all my clients that have faithfully supported me over the years. It really is a privilege and an honour to meet so many friends around the globe. I hope all of you have progressed in your careers, and I wish you all the best, and looking forward to make new friends in time to come!!

Are you 100% confident that your Excel calculations are correct in determining fleet numbers? Are your roads accurately set-up in terms of stop signs, single carriage areas, steep gradients, single-bay dumps? What happens when you have congestion in your pit, how does Excel cater for that? With the HAULSIM simulations you can set up your site accurately to generate realistic results in terms of fleet numbers. The simulations allow you to run a host of possible scenarios, to ensure you understand the flex of your loading & hauling system, and better prepare for possible surprises. Doing a little homework now might just save you years of agony when things don’t pan as out as hoped, and more im

Know the feeling... when you're losing precious time because of fighting the software instead of running iterations and scenarios... You will never have confidence in your schedule if you do not have 2 or 3 scenarios to test the flex of your system. Your superiors want a number of options, not just one answer. RPMGlobal's XPAC SOLUTIONS products (OPMS & SMS) allows you to do just that - run scenarios instead of suffering in silence. With almost a decade of open pit scheduling experience allow me to help you create options for your company, so you can make informed decisions, and understand the risks with confidence!

Sugilite is a rare mineral and a gemstone best known for its vibrant pink to purple colours. High-quality specimens are sought after by mineral collectors and lapidarists (people who cut and polish gems). Sugilite is a sodium potassium lithium silicate mineral. Small amounts of manganese produce the pink to purple colour displayed by some specimens of sugilite. Its chemical composition is as follows: KNa2(Fe,Mn,Al)2Li3Si12O30. The composition of sugilite varies because iron, manganese, and aluminum can substitute for one another. This makes the colour and other properties of sugilite variable - "Geology.com".

The kind guys at RPMGlobal have agreed to reduce the price of this online course significantly to accommodate students and self-paying employees. The online Mining for Non-Miners training course is the perfect starting point if you work in, or with, the industry but don't come from a mining background. The course modules include: [if !supportLists]· [endif]Overview of the Mining Industry; [if !supportLists]· [endif]Geology, Exploration, Modelling & Reporting; [if !supportLists]· [endif]Mine Planning & Asset Management; [if !supportLists]· [endif]Surface Mining; [if !supportLists]· [endif]Underground Mining (Metals); [if !supportLists]· [endif]

Toquepala copper mine, situated 870km away from Lima in Southern Peru, ranks as the world’s fifth largest copper mine by reserve. The open-pit mine was estimated to contain 17.65Mt of copper reserve as of December 2012. Southern Copper Corporation (SCC), a subsidiary of Grupo Mexico, owns and operates the mine. Toquepala produced about 152,000t of copper in 2012, including 120,000t of copper concentrates and 32,000t of copper cathodes. Ore is extracted from the Toquepala porphyry copper deposit located in the southern-most Andes Mountains of Peru. The extracted ore is refined at an on-site concentrator with a milling capacity of 60,000tpd. The concentrate output is transported to the smelter

How sure are you that your mine designs have the minimum number of switchbacks? Have you tested the impact of having one switchback less, how that reduces your strip ratio and down-the-line costs, not to mention the health & safety of your employees ...? What about your benches & stacks, do they honour the geotechnical slope angles to prevent slope failure...? Your ramp systems on your interim high-walls - do they tie up with your final design and serve as dual access for that rainy day when you need it most...? Difficult questions I know, but prevention is better than cure as they say. Using state-of-the-art mine design software and almost a decade of design experience, I can help you sleep

The Bucyrus RH400, now owned by Caterpillar, is said to hold the title of the world's biggest hydraulic excavator. This monster is a front shovel excavator and weighs in at around 980 tonnes. This mine chewer has an undercarriage width of 8.6 meters and crawler length of 10.98 meters. Just one scoop of the shovel can remove 45 cubic meters of material. With a crowd force of 3,300 kN and a breakout force of 2,400 kN it will defy any unfortunate rock face to resist this machine. The Bucyrus RH400 is powered by two 16-cylinder Cat 3516B or Cummins QSK60 diesel engines - "Interestingengineering.com".

The mining industry is notorious for its volatile nature as commodity prices fluctuate. History shows that it's the companies that can adjust to the market changes the quickest that lead the pack. Mining on a 5-year old mine design that was based on a Whittle shell all those years ago can mean you're either leaving value in the ground, or more detrimental, you're now mining in areas where profitability is going South... With almost a decade of Whittle open pit optimisation experience I can help you dust off that old Whittle model, and make sure your mine is set up to run at maximum profitability under current economic conditions... Doesn't hurt to make sure now does it...

After starting an overhand stope the shape in which the back is carried is often of prime importance. Position A in the figure illustrates the method of carrying a flat or longitudinal back (the term long-wall is used sometimes when the vein lies nearly flat). In this method the benches or breasts are frequently made of a height sufficient to allow of a square set being placed. This is done at Butte and it is often referred to as breast stoping - 911 Metallurgist.

The online Mining for Non-Miners training course is the perfect starting point if you work in, or with, the industry but don't come from a mining background. The course modules include: [if !supportLists]· [endif]Overview of the Mining Industry; [if !supportLists]· [endif]Geology, Exploration, Modelling & Reporting; [if !supportLists]· [endif]Mine Planning & Asset Management; [if !supportLists]· [endif]Surface Mining; [if !supportLists]· [endif]Underground Mining (Metals); [if !supportLists]· [endif]Underground Mining (Coal); as well as [if !supportLists]· [endif]Processing & Extractive Metallurgy. Mining for Non-Miners (Online) can be

My kind associate Kenn Smart allowed me to use this graphic from his collection of BASICS of EARTHMOVING booklets. Have you ever wondered how to calculate the tonnes per hour output of large hydraulic excavators incorporating job variables...? Have a look and do please feel free to comment...

COVID-19 has been ruthless to almost every mine's productivity. Every hour lost is impossible to gain back. So how do you optimise on the remaining production hours? With travel restrictions in place we can't come to you, but we can certainly add value by utilising your mine's live camera feed. For mine's that do not have these systems in place yet, we have industry partners to be of service. We will be conducting a zoom discussion early next week to explain the semantics - interested parties please inquire for details...

The HAULSIM (Underground) Online course provides flexible and convenient training on the core features of RPM’s HAULSIM solution. Participants will learn how to simulate productivity and cost of equipment, through pre-configured workshops designed around real-life scenarios. The learning outcomes of the course are: [if !supportLists]· [endif]Navigate around the software [if !supportLists]· [endif]Access the product’s help [if !supportLists]· [endif]Create and update a mine haulage simulation [if !supportLists]· [endif]Import data into the simulation [if !supportLists]· [endif]Understand the equipment library [if !supportLists]· [endif]How to

Staurolite is a mineral that is commonly found in metamorphic rocks such as schist and gneiss. It forms when shale is strongly altered by regional metamorphism. It is often found in association with almandine garnet, muscovite, and kyanite - minerals that form under similar temperature and pressure conditions. Staurolite is a silicate mineral with a generalized chemical composition of (Fe,Mg)2Al9Si4O23(OH). It is usually brown or black in colour with a resinous to vitreous lustre. It ranges from transparent to opaque in diaphaneity. Staurolite is usually easy to identify when it occurs as visible grains in a metamorphic rock. Grains of staurolite are typically larger than the grains of other

The HAULSIM (Surface) Online course provides flexible and convenient training on the core features of RPM’s HAULSIM solution. Participants will learn how to simulate productivity and cost of equipment, through pre-configured workshops designed around real life scenarios. The learning outcomes of the course are: [if !supportLists]· [endif]Navigate around the software [if !supportLists]· [endif]Access the product’s help [if !supportLists]· [endif]Create and update a mine haulage simulation [if !supportLists]· [endif]Import data into the simulation [if !supportLists]· [endif]Understand the equipment library [if !supportLists]· [endif]How to use d

El Teniente (The Lieutenant) copper mine, the world’s sixth biggest copper mine by reserve, is located 80km south of Santiago in the Andes mountain range in Chile. El Teniente was estimated to contain 15.2Mt of fine copper (1,538Mt of ore grading 0.99% copper) at the beginning of 2013. Mining activities at El Teniente started in 1904. Codelco owns and operates the mine. Kennecott Copper Corporation was the operator before Codelco came into being in 1976. The copper products of El Teniente include fire refined lingots (RAF) and copper cathodes. The mine has its own smelter near the site and produces more than 400,000t of fine copper a year. The production in 2012 included 417,244t of fine cop

The TALPAC-3D Online course provides flexible and convenient training on the core features of RPMGlobal's TALPAC-3D solution. Participants will learn how to simulate productivity and cost of equipment, through pre-configured workshops designed around real-life scenarios. The learning outcomes of the course are: [if !supportLists]· [endif]Navigate around the software [if !supportLists]· [endif]Access the product’s help [if !supportLists]· [endif]Create and update a mine haulage simulation [if !supportLists]· [endif]Import data into the simulation [if !supportLists]· [endif]Understand the equipment library [if !s

Ranked as the second biggest hydraulic excavator in the world, the Hitachi EX8000-6 is the bigger brother of the Hitachi EX5600-6. Weighing in at 811 tonnes, it comes with both shovel and backhoe attachments. The first of these beasts was delivered to Stanwell's Meandu coal mine in Australia in 2013. The Hitachi EX8000-6 is 10.5 meters long and has an undercarriage width of 8.65 meters. Its bucket has a capacity of 45 cubic meters. Crowding and breakout shovel forces are 2,870 kN and 2,230 kN respectively. Two 16-cylinder Cummins QSKTA60-CE diesel engines power the monster with 3,800 hp at 1,800 rpm. It also comes in an electric version - "Interestingengineering.com".

Have a group of employees that need basic training in terms of mine planning software? Or perhaps a refresher course to get those rusty skills oiled up? Or perhaps professional development is the next step for your employees... Be it as it may, the School of Rock prides itself as a preferred service provider in terms of empowering your group of individuals to tailor-made requirements. Kindly click on the link below for particulars: "https://www.schoolofrockmining.com/group-training-and-courses" Alternatively, send me an email at: "info@schoolofrockmining.com"