SIMULATORS
Sims tech custom
providers
Sandvik decided to use Mevea Simulation
Software and services globally to develop
virtual prototyping
trailer loading, safety corridor management, and
more. By training operators in this virtual world,
organisations will see reduced wear and tear on
their equipment, while simultaneously reducing
risks to trainees and other personnel.”
Designed for deployment on any of its Vortex
simulators, CM Labs’ Excavator Simulator
Training Pack has been approved by professional
excavator operators as a learning platform that
behaves and reacts just like the real equipment.
“Operator safety training is all about developing
respect for the machine,” says Drew Carruthers,
CM Labs’ Construction Line Manager. “Our
Training Pack exposes operators to the real
sights, sounds, and feel of a 21 t excavator. It’ll
push you around. You’ll feel it dig and rattle like
you’re out in the yard.”
The Excavator Simulator Training Pack focuses
on the three training pillars of safety, technique,
and efficiency. While it automatically detects
safety violations – including contacts with power
lines or people, hazardous load trajectories, and
turnovers – it also captures objective scores to
indicate technical proficiency, including
completion time, movement efficiency and
accuracy, bucket efficiency, and more.
The training pack’s high-quality visuals include
realistic worksite and machine graphics, as well
as award-winning soil graphics that are the result
of decades of academic research. This realism
engages trainees in a learning experience that
translates directly into worksite skills, explains
Lisa Barbieri, CM Labs’ VP Marketing.
“To learn real operating skills, you need real-
life conditions,” she says. “That’s why CM Labs
continually invests in R&D that’s geared toward
advancing the construction industry’s leading
training visuals — this is of course just one
ingredient of a world-class training solution, but
if it doesn’t look right, the training won’t feel
right either.”
The training packs’ advanced learning tools
include a Grade Quality Sensor (GQS) overlay,
which provides visual indications to operators as
a reminder to maintain a safety corridor on both
sides of the trench. The GQS can be activated
at any time during the exercise. In addition to
real-time feedback on excavation height, slope,
and consistency, the GQS will also provide an
overall excavation performance score to
operators.
The new training pack also introduces a
“sandbox” exercise that allows operators to
refine their skills by excavating near a water pipe
or manhole, lifting tyres, or manipulating a
trench box or gravel box.
In addition, operators and instructors can
change the time of day at any moment during the
exercise in order to practice for night time
operations. They can also introduce inclement
climate conditions, which can be difficult or
impossible to recreate in a training yard.
The Excavator Simulator Training Pack is part
of CM Labs’ extensive product line of
earthmoving and lifting crane training packs, all
of which can be run from a single Vortex
simulator. Solutions range from training packs for
crawler crane, flat-top tower crane, luffing tower
crane, and mobile crane, to backhoe, wheel
loader and motor grader.
Mevea is a Finnish high-tech
company and one of the leading
real-time simulation and digital
twin technology providers. Mevea
was founded in 2005 as a spin-off
from Lappeenranta University of
Technology. It has helped key
mining equipment OEMs in
providing them with simulation
options for training but also
product development.Since then,
Mevea has delivered more than
100 simulator models to more than
50 customers globally. Mevea has
a close co-operation with several
universities and research institutes
to provide world-class solutions to
its customers.
Normet is well known to IM and
provides advanced solutions for
selected customer processes in
underground mining and
tunnelling such as sprayed concrete applications.
With over 10,000 delivered machines, Normet is
one of the market leaders in its product segments.
Normet opted to use custom-built training
simulator solutions from Mevea. These solutions
include a wide range of training exercises for
operators and service personnel. Realistic
behaviour is achieved through an accurate virtual
machine, OEM designs, equipment, and work
process models, including real-time hydraulics
simulation and integration with real machine
control hardware and software. Thanks to the
simulator, operators trained at the Normet
Academy have been able to improve their
efficiency by 23% and at the same time increase
the quality, decrease material costs and learn
safer operating procedures.
In machine development, to enhance product
quality and performance and at the same time
decrease product development lead time and cost,
Sandvik wanted to develop virtual product
validation in the early design stages. The ultimate
goal was to have a working virtual prototype
which could be used for customer validation
before the end of concept design stage. Sandvik
decided to use Mevea Simulation Software and
services globally to develop virtual prototyping.
With working virtual prototypes, including real-
time hydraulics simulation, Sandvik has been able
to increase product understanding during the
concept stage and replace some physical tests like
machine dynamic stability with virtual testing. Arto
Vento, Lead Structural Engineer, Sandvik Mining:
“Virtual validation makes it possible to accept
product solutions at the early stage without any
physical prototypes.” Work has included drill rig
stability testing for the Sandvik Pantera DI8600. IM
DECEMBER 2018 | International Mining 33