• TECHNOLOGY
of human interactions between equipment and heavy mobile equipment is reduced . So , you ' ve got fewer instances of people in harm ' s way . So , safety is also improved ,” says Goode .
Piloting the new technology – in hot and cold weather regions Goode explains that Pitcrew has been working on the hardware and AI of the inspection stations for the past ten years and the camera is of the highest calibre , being military compatible . The testing phase for the partnered solution has been done over the past year and is currently being piloted in Canada , with Chile , Mozambique , and an additional site in Canada to follow suit . Goode stipulates that the system has proven its worth in hot weather regions , such as Western Australia . The first installation on the African continent will take place at a mine in Mozambique in the coming months , and the benefits experienced there will be shared as and when it is possible .
Goode notes that the Canadian pilot project has required further development of the technology to create a cold weather version with more support for the technology and a revised battery system . The cold weather version is capable of withstanding temperatures of -40 ° C .
“ So , the technology is still very new . And in terms of the integrated piece with TOMS , we have had Pitcrew creating work orders in TOMS as of October 2021 , and we ' re in the process of putting the business rule infrastructure in place to reduce those 5 000 reported issues into something that ' s both practical and manageable . And then we can start getting into the productivity impacts after assimilating the learnings from each site ,” says Goode .
Goode emphasises that the new technology offers an enhanced inspection system that can be married with local knowledge of how tyres wear in a particular location , adding valuable local context to the data on the ground , saying , “ The combining of the people with the AI – I think is where the real value will be .”
Goode stresses that the idea is to become ‘ smarter ’ at setting the business parameters in TOMS and to know how to flex these parameters , depending on each customer mine operational strategy . He cites one major challenge in piloting the system , and that is getting to a point of being able to measure the ‘ predictive ’ benefits of the system , saying , “ The challenge we have is that tyres are relatively long-life assets . In open-pit environments , for instance , they can last from 9 to 12 months . Each time we identify an issue , we need to know the final failure event or tire scrap date to learn from it . The learning process is therefore going to take both time and data , and furthermore understanding that site A is going to be different from site B , based on climate , haulage speed , road material and so on . We ' re going to have to learn with each mine site , over time , in other words , how do we turn the sensor data of today into predictive action in the future ?
“ With this said , though , what Kal Tire does have ready and at hand is around 1 000 manual inspectors in the field , across our operations globally , and those folks have a lot of experience and local knowledge . And because they ' re doing manual inspections in TOMS today , if we can marry their feedback , along with the images from the camera , maybe we can accelerate the process .”
24 • African Mining • February 2022 www . africanmining . co . za