MINING HOISTS
One ABB project involves delivery of two new hoists to the underground development project at Lucara’ s Karowe diamond mine in Botswana
Hanging in the balance
Mining hoists represent the heart of deep mining operations, both through the winders themselves but also the controls, electrics, braking systems and the wire ropes themselves. Paul Moore looks at some developments in this space
Safety is at the forefront of any hoisting project, and recent years have seen a focus on SIL 3 rated braking systems, which utilise multiple, independent, and redundant braking mechanisms and control systems to ensure that a single failure does not compromise the overall safety function.
The latest version of ABB’ s Ability™ Safety Plus Hoist Protector suite for hoists it says is the world’ s first fully SIL 3 certified mine hoist solution incorporating monitoring, brakes and drive; and ABB claims it offers the highest level of safety in the market.
But the real game changer ABB says is that with Version 3 it has productised its safety technology.“ Compared with designing a bespoke safety solution for every hoist and its site and having to perform the complete functional safety verification and validation on each project, Safety Plus Hoist Protector V 3.0 is already validated for 25 different safety functions, off the shelf, at a significantly lower cost to customers. Because the product itself is validated, we don’ t have to perform all those activities at every site – which lowers the barrier to investing in safety. Furthermore, if other custom safety functions are required for a particular site, the product is already prepared for a simple integration of these functions into its ecosystem.”
Secondly, ABB argues that as much research-and-development time and money
28 as one spends on a single site-specific solution, nothing is perfect – there is always more to be done.“ But having products that handle the whole mine hoist safety across an ever expanding number of customer sites allows us to get feedback from a global user base, and whatever improvements in performance, safety and reduced downtime that we make from those learnings can in turn be redeployed to all sites, often with just a software upgrade.”
Looking at other technologies, ABB’ s hoist monitoring platform, ABB Ability Smart Hoisting, has recently delivered significant productivity improvements for a European mining customer. By reducing the total hoist cycle time by 18 seconds, ABB was able to enhance efficiency across all phases of the hoisting process through close collaboration between their engineering team and the customer. While 18 seconds might seem minimal, this reduction translates to over US $ 3.5 million per year in added revenue due to the increased productivity.
On the upgrading side of the business, in 2014, LKAB entrusted ABB to lead a generational upgrade project of eight mine hoists at LKAB’ s iron ore mine in Kiruna, Sweden. This project, valued at approximately SEK1.5 billion, plays a crucial role in LKAB’ s long-term investment to enhance operational reliability, productivity, and safety. For this generational upgrade project, ABB has delivered mechanical equipment for the mine hoisting facilities and shaft, electrical and control equipment as well as electrical installation, installation supervision, construction management and commissioning. The project was finalised in 2025 on time and below budget and will ensure productive and safe operations for at least another 25 years.
Finally on new complete hoist systems, in Australia, ABB is an important partner in the BHP-owned Prominent Hill copper-goldsilver mine’ s transformation from a trucking site to an electric hoisting operation. First announced two years ago, the Wira shaft expansion is now well advanced, and it is expected to be fully operational by the end of 2025.
Having started as an open-pit mine 15 years ago, Prominent Hill in South Australia now extends more than a kilometre underground. It is currently moving more than 4.5 Mt / y, but with trucking costs rapidly increasing as the depth does, the whole operation was set to become uneconomical by 2033. ABB is supplying what is set to be Australia’ s largest and most powerful hoist, capable of lifting almost 40 t up a 1,300 m shaft in as little as 90 seconds. The hoist is set to expand the mine’ s production capacity up to 6.5 Mt / y, an increase of more than a third. With advanced remote monitoring and predictive maintenance capabilities, the Wira shaft hoist is expected to have more than 90 % availability.
ABB will deploy remote drivetrain health and monitoring services to predict maintenance and safety issues early; plus analyse speed, payload and energy consumption on each hoist cycle for further optimisation. The system will use energy regeneration and storage to balance electrical network loads when operating the hoist. BHP is predicting that the move to electric hoisting will cut operating costs by a fifth, with a drop in CO 2 emissions of more than a quarter. The hoist will also use ABB Ability Safety Plus.
FLSmidth – a range of experience
FLSmidth’ s experience covers a range of hoisting technologies, including Koepe, single and double drum, and Blair multi-rope hoists( BMRs). It states that it has designed and manufactured more Blair multi-rope hoists than any other supplier. It was also the first company to design and deliver a mining hoist with a winding depth of 3,150 m – for Moab Khotsong, now owned by Harmony Gold. Other high profile Blair hoist projects have included installations at Mopani Copper Mines in Zambia for the Mindora and Mufulira shafts.
FLS hoist technology capabilities include the supply of the Hooke’ s joint, a
International Mining | AUGUST 2025