MINE MAINTENANCE
Tightening tools
Nord-Lock Group, meanwhile, has been improving routine maintenance on critical equipment at an iron ore mine in Brazil using its Superbolt ® Tool.
Superbolt was already the standard for rope shovels at the mining operation in Carajás, with the removal and remounting of the brand’ s multi-jackbolt tensioners from the heavy-duty machines’ sideframes nothing new for a maintenance session like the one in July 2025. Using the Superbolt Tool to loosen and tighten them, however, was new.
The mine’ s vendor for heavy machinery parts, Grupo Hidrau Torque( GHT), was aiming to upgrade the installation and removal processes. As one of Latin America’ s leading distributors of replacement and spare parts for industries like mining, GHT understood that solutions raising maintenance efficiency would also reduce downtime for machines and increase its clients’ productivity and bottom line.
“ The Superbolt system removes the need for large conventional tooling,” José De La Cruz, Nord-Lock Group’ s Sales Manager for Superbolt in Latin America, says.“ You can just use a regular torque wrench.”
Yet, dismounting and reinstalling the tensioners can still be tedious and timeconsuming, with customers asking how to further speed up the process.“ The
Superbolt Tool just comes in and tightens them all at once at the same time,” De La Cruz said.
Superbolt technology uses multiple mechanical jackbolts encircled in the body of a nut to create a secure bolted connection. It remains fixed against serious vibrations and extreme conditions that have previously required giant threaded bolts weighing up to 45 kg. But since the jackbolts are smaller, they can be tightened with simple hand tools to generate the clamping force that holds the tensioner in place.
“ It generates a precise and uniform clamping force, eliminating concerns about thread friction or overtightening,” De La Cruz says.“ You’ re getting pure torque.”
Although the jackbolts are quick and easy to adjust, one large Superbolt tensioner can house more than a dozen. A single section of just one machine, like the sideframe of a rope shovel, can use several tensioners. As a result, while it’ s still faster, simpler and safer than conventional large bolts and tools, loosening and tightening Superbolt connections by hand often requires considerable time and effort.
The Superbolt Tool is a power tool series with integrated drive units and cassettes. Each one is designed to match a specific size of Superbolt tensioner and fit against its jackbolts, Nord-Lock explains.
Rope shovels are critical to operations,
The Superbolt Tool is a power tool series with integrated drive units and cassettes. Each one is designed to match a specific size of Superbolt tensioner and fit against its jackbolts, Nord-Lock explains
so unexpected repairs or prolonged maintenance have serious consequences. GHT is well aware of this, with De La Cruz quoting a conservative range of $ 60,000 to $ 80,000 for each hour this machine is not running.
Mining operations still use conventional
44 International Mining | JANUARY 2026