Mining operations are extremely hazardous and take place in unpredictable environments. The best way to protect the lives of miners is through industrial automation and unmanned mining equipment that can be remotely controlled and monitored at a safe distance.
With these objectives in mind, a leading global supplier of machinery and technical solutions for mining operations partnered with Moxa to develop an innovative remote drilling system for global mines located in countries such as Sweden or Australia to operate haulers and drilling equipment from a distance. By reducing the time mine operators spend at dangerous drilling sites, the new remote drilling and hauling system minimises dangers from falling rocks, flammable dust, exhaust fumes, extreme temperature fluctuations and vibrations.
Moreover, remote operation also increases productivity by eliminating the regions where workers and trucks co-work by making the trucks completely automatic, which eliminates the issue of having to stop the trucks when workers enter the vicinity. Such safety related stops being mandatory in mixed areas where human operators and mining machines co-work with each other.
Challenges
*Equipment must be resistant to harsh and highly-corrosive underground environments.
* Reliable wireless solution for video transmission in unpredictable reflective underground tunnels.
* Quick and easy installation.
The mine operators required industrial reliability real-time WLAN connections with full coverage from underground mine to surface control centre
The solution
The mine uses two separate automated systems to streamline operations. The first is a video monitoring installed on the automated loading and hauling system, used to monitor an underground fleet of driverless trucks from a remote ground-level control centre. A stable video transmission is necessary to allow the control centre operators to monitor the trucks. Respective IP cameras are mounted on the front and rear of each vehicle.
The second system consists of stationary rock breakers which are grounded to a single location and are remotely controlled. Transparent data transmission allows sending of data such as CAN-bus data.
To integrate with systems operating deep below ground, the ADC12 encased AWK-4121, an IP68 rated IEEE 802.11 a/b/g wireless AP/bridge/client, was used to establish a safe and reliable wireless LAN to provide monitoring of the driverless trucks. The AWK-4121 was chosen because of its rugged design, easy-to-install features, reliable millisecond-level handoffs with Turbo Roaming and flexible transmission power to overcome the challenges posed by the unpredictable underground tunnel surface.
Furthermore, the AWK-4121 is equipped with a wide operating temperature range to allow constant connectivity under extreme temperature fluctuations from the mouth of the mine down to the heated underground locations. By installing several units along the tunnels, drilling locations and on each of the driverless trucks, operators can now easily manage the trucks and drilling machines over WLAN.
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