First LoaderMetrics™ Install in South Africa Already Paying Off

Africa has been one of our fastest-growing business regions in recent years, and now we can add a new milestone to our list of developments here – our first LoaderMetrics™ installation in South Africa!  The solution was purchased by an existing customer and has already detected two missing teeth since installation.

This client is a large iron ore mine in South Africa.  The mine was already using ShovelMetrics™ to prevent broken shovel teeth from jamming crushers downstream and was so pleased with the results that they decided to bring our Missing Tooth Detection technology to their loader fleet!  We also upgraded their existing ShovelMetrics™ solutions to our newest deep learning system.

This was a big project.  In addition to sending remote support workers in South Africa and Botswana to support this multi-machine installation, we also dispatched our Vancouver Installations and Systems Specialist Peter Hsieh to assist with onboarding.  In all, three employees from the Motion Metrics Support team spent 18 days working to outfit the loader and perform hardware and software upgrades for seven shovels.

Hsieh monitored the new LoaderMetrics™ system closely after installation to ensure it was working to the best of its ability.  Indeed, within the first eight weeks of operation, the system caught two missing loader teeth.  “The mine wanted to see proof of how the system works,” says Hsieh.  “Well here is the fresh material!”  If the broken teeth had gone undetected, they could have travelled downstream with the ore and jammed crushers – a dangerous and costly scenario.  We’re very happy to learn that the LoaderMetrics™ Missing Tooth Detection has already paid for itself in the months since its installation.

A missing tooth incident was captured by the Motion Metrics system on May 29th, 2018 at 23:33:50.  Tooth N˚5 on the bucket of Loader994H was detected as broken and the system’s alarm was sounded.

LoaderMetrics™ uses a thermal camera and deep learning algorithms to detect missing teeth even when they are obscured by mud or debris.  To learn about this revolutionary new solution for all loader types, visit our product page.