AUSTRALIAN METS event occurs through monitoring and trend analysis at the individual cell level ,” he said . “ Then , due to the modular nature of the design and the plug-and-play , cable-free hardware , we can access the enclosure , take out an individual Bladevolt , replace it and have the system reenter the field .”
Such a design came about after hearing the problems early adopters in North America ’ s underground mining sector were having with identifying and replacing faulty cells in large battery packs .
Parties interested in seeing Bladevolt in action can look to the military space for one of the first use cases . 3ME Tech has just been granted a project from Defence Science and Technology ( part of the Australian Department of Defence ) to electrify a large , armoured infantry fighting vehicle with Bladevolt and its other core safety components from the mining industry .
Bladevolt will also feature on mining vehicles going to sites later this year , Bain says . Longer term , he sees OEMs standardising with Bladevolt on small-to-medium-size battery-electric vehicle platforms . There is also a hazardous area variant in the pipeline called Bladevolt-X .
The 1,000 V AC on-board charger Lawn mentioned is also set for an industry debut .
This charger , a collaboration with Bel Power Solutions , covers the DC output range of most light-to medium duty cycle battery-electric OEM
platforms currently on the market , according to Lawn .
Coming in 25 kW stacks for a maximum of 100 kW of on-board charging , the mobile chargers integrate directly with mine site infrastructure and will soon be charging up the TRITEV running around at Tritton Copper Operations . This is one of 25 charging units set to be deployed across Australia .
Alongside this , the company has also developed its own Power Distribution Unit ( PDU ) – a one-stop safety shop for the electric vehicle system , Lawn says – that is IP rated and has passed all functional safety requirements .
This is but a fraction of what 3ME Tech has up its sleeve , with Bain admitting the company currently has more projects on the go than people to service them . The latest news as IM went to press was a new ~ A $ 140 million partnership where 3ME Tech will supply Batt Mobile Equipment upwards of 150 Electric Vehicle Engine packages over the next five years to power BME ’ s 20 t Integrated Tool Carrier BEV retrofits .
Interoperable autonomy
Universal Field Robotics ( UFR ) also has METS Ignited to thank for some of its recent success in the Australian mining technology space .
The creator of autonomous robots has received valuable support from the industry growth centre , helping with matchmaking and introductions to miners who have specific challenges and interest in innovative automation solutions , according to Managing Director , Jeff Sterling .
“ The endorsement of METS Ignited has shortened the time required to develop a relationship with mining companies to enable proof of concept trials , which has proven critical in getting new products developed and to market ,” he told IM .
It is hard to know if UFR would have struck up relationships with major miners like Anglo American and Teck without METS Ignited ’ s help , but that is the company it is now keeping on a regular basis .
UFR , IMDEX and Orica have collaborated on delivering BLAST DOG™ , a semi-autonomous system to optimise open-pit mining blasting based on high-resolution three-dimensional material models built from sensor data . The system is aimed at helping miners get predictable fragmentation and determining ore and waste boundaries , control vibration , dust , fumes and heave .
While COVID-19 has hit the company ’ s mine site trial progress , BLAST DOG has already been tested at Anglo ’ s Dawson coal mine in Queensland and at a mine in Chile . At the heart of this solution is UFRautonomy . “ This is universal to all the solutions we are developing , and each solution is feeding back to
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