HEAVY ENGINEERING & WEAR PARTS
In addition , Austin said it had already received a very encouraging level of orders for its 2023 financial year .
In a competitive market for specialist truck trays and buckets , Austin ’ s products continue to stand out due to the amount of R & D investment it continues to put into solutions and the ongoing support it provides customers , according to Singleton .
The company has around an 18 % market share in the global truck tray market , with a significant presence in the specialised bucket market .
“ We ’ re the biggest producer of truck trays in the world ,” he said . “ That size has allowed us to invest in R & D , and that continual investment allows us to increment our product continuously – which we have been doing this year – as well as occasionally make a step-change to our product – as we did when the original ULTIMA product came to market .”
Some of the more recent R & D work to come out of its Australia and US hubs includes an update to its ULTIMA truck tray – termed ULTIMA 2.0 – a new and improved JEC High Performance Bucket range that leverages some of the design aspects of Austin ’ s original two-piece bucket , and “ enhanced logistics body designs ”.
The ULTIMA 2.0 development came from a fact-finding mission the company embarked on with its coal mining customers on the eastern side of Australia .
“ The new ULTIMA 2.0 design removes the nose-to-tail interface issue that has caused haul truck operator accidents in the past at some mining operations , including at coal mines ,” Singleton said . “ Because it is a safety issue that needs addressing across industry , it became the mainstream design for not only our ULTIMA coal body , but the entire range . The design ensures you don ’ t get that interference if one truck happens to go into the back of another .”
The other evolution of the ULTIMA was related to reducing the weight of the truck body . This is another common request from mining companies , especially those high tonnage operations with hundreds of trucks in their earthmoving fleets .
“ In iron ore mines , for instance , weight can be very important ,” Singleton explained . “ An ultraclass haul truck at these operations is probably doing something like 5,000 rotations a year , so removing 10 tonnes of weight from our truck tray and providing 10 extra tonnes of payload in one of those truck bodies can be worth A $ 3 million a year in additional revenue to a miner .
“ Some miners will have several hundred of those trucks , so this amounts to hundreds of millions of dollars of savings that far outweigh the initial investment in the new truck tray .”
Some of these new ULTIMA 2.0 trays are going through the final build stage and will go into operation shortly , Singleton told IM at the start of May .
The changes to the JEC High Performance Bucket , which is a two-piece design , hinge on the need to rebuild these buckets over their lifetime .
“ What we realised with the two-piece bucket is that if we take that concept and adapt it slightly , it helps in the rebuild market ,” Singleton said . “ It has allowed us to think about designing a bucket with rebuild in mind .”
This redesign has seen more components and sub-assemblies fitted on a new bucket with removal and replacement factored in – changes that have been appreciated by Austin ’ s mining customers given the recent influx of orders .
“ If you look at the iron ore market , for instance , an excavator bucket might last three years , but it will have at least two , if not three , rebuilds during that time ,” Singleton said .
Alongside designing for rebuilds , the company has also been addressing the logistics associated with building and transporting its truck trays around the world .
As has been well documented , logistics and supply chains have been coming under increased scrutiny since the outbreak of COVID and continue to be a focus area for mining companies with the current geopolitical situation in Russia and Ukraine .
This is where the company ’ s “ enhanced logistics body designs ” are coming to the fore .
This is premised on the idea that engineers can manufacture the major parts of a truck body ,