MINE HOISTS
On the ropes
Paul Moore talks to four leaders in the supply of hoisting systems about what makes the market tick from a technology, maintenance and safety point of view
Digitalisation is without question a major focus area right across today’ s mining industry, and hoisting systems are no exception. ABB is probably the best example of the global hoist suppliers in terms of the breadth of‘ smart’ hoisting related technologies in recent years. These include ABB Ability™ NGX Hoist Control( 2022) and ABB Ability™ Smart Hoisting( 2024).
The former is a standardised, scalable global control platform for mining hoists. It integrates advanced user interfaces, dual touchscreen monitors, and modular features to adapt to any hoist type- including single / double drum, friction, and Blair multi-rope systems. The latter is a digital suite of solutions designed to optimise and monitor vertical ore haulage in mining operations. By collecting field data via sensors, the system tracks KPIs) like cycle times, motor speed, and brake performance, providing predictive maintenance alerts, hazard identification, and remote support.
To get some sense of what level of uptake there has been of these technologies in the market, what value are customers seeing from them, plus any distinction of them being applied to greenfield hoist projects versus the retrofit market, IM spoke at length to John Manuell, Global Business Unit Manager – Hoisting at ABB.
He states:“ These two technologies are a really big focus from our side at ABB – initially from an R & D point of view and now actually applying them in the market, as well as adding new functionalities and features. In terms of uptake, hoisting is a very traditional industry and it is taking some time, but in 2025 / 2026 we have seen a real increase in both interest and actual
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ABB’ s reference list includes the production hoist at BHP Jansen, the world’ s largest with a 75 t capacity
deployment of ABB Ability™ Smart Hoisting. The laser focus across mining on the power of digitalisation in areas like predictive maintenance has meant customers are more attuned and aware of the benefits. By that I mean there is a much greater understanding of how data analytics can be used to improve availability and productivity as well.”
Manuell added:“ ABB Ability™ NGX Hoist Control is more of a base level control for the hoist, but also has big benefits in terms of fault finding, sequences of events, and supporting decision making when something does go wrong. And I think that’ s also something where customers see a lot of value.”
While greenfield projects are important for these technologies, as there are relatively few major new hoists being commissioned on an annual basis, he says the larger hoist digitalisation market is for retrofits and modernisation projects of existing hoists.
“ This is both for our own installed base but also on the competitor installed base. In both cases we can take an old hoist, retain as much as we can while overhauling the rest, but then also add these additional features so that you can gain much better analytics and data from these older installations. Replacing legacy control systems is a really important part of the market – especially for ABB Ability™ Smart Hoisting, as you can start collecting data immediately and then use that for better decision making.”
Manuell added that even this process of starting to collect data has importance and significance when it comes to applying more AI in the medium term and algorithm training. He also said that ABB sees these smart hoisting technologies as a differentiator when you see the bigger picture in terms of incorporating the hoisting data into a plantwide asset performance management or operations management system.
What about defined benefits?“ The potential benefits are quite significant. While there are always site specific conditions, we recently did a survey looking at customers that are focusing on proactive hoist maintenance rather than more reactive maintenance processes. There was a 15 % greater availability with a focus on proactive maintenance. Tools like smart hoisting are making that a lot easier to achieve. The hoist is a potential bottleneck in your production. So that 15 % is a lot more ore that you’ re getting out the ground. From a performance point of view, we also worked with one customer on data we were collecting from smart hoisting and analysis by our engineering teams and so on, and we found that we could reduce their cycle time by 18 seconds, which is maybe a 7-8 % reduction. Over a year, that’ s really making a difference to your productivity.”
Finally, he said that ABB is actively trying to make hoist digitalisation part of the discussions with mining and engineering houses earlier and to emphasise the bigger picture, that the hoist is part of a complete transport system.” The more awareness throughout the process that you have, the better. And I think mining companies and EPCMs are realising this. We are also having discussions about the role of these technologies in long term planning for customer hoists – such as their future options to upgrade and add additional levels of control or autonomy during hoist upgrades in 10 or even 15 years time.”
Moving on to safety – in 2020, ABB introduced ABB Ability™ Safety Plus for hoists, the world’ s first fully SIL 3( Safety Integrity Level 3) certified mine hoist suite. It is composed of three solutions offering the highest level of safety available on the market: Safety Plus Hoist Monitor, Safety Plus Brake System, Safety Plus Hoist Protector.
Manuell told IM:“ There has been quite an interesting progression. Early on, functional hoist safety was partly legislation driven, first in Australia and then starting to move to Quebec and Sweden and various other regions as well. But what we saw after that first stage was the global mining companies questioning if they were introducing the highest safety level in one region, why weren’ t they doing it at all of their sites globally, whether to comply with regulations or not? Today, what’ s also interesting is we’ ve seen a lot of interest from smaller mining companies and in countries that there’ s no legal requirement at all for SIL 3. In Africa we now have more ABB Ability™ Safety Plus for hoists installs than
International Mining | AUGUST 2026