IM March 2024 March 24 | Page 58

PRE-CONCENTRATION & ORE SORTING commercial operation at Grasberg and New Afton shortly .
“ Block cave mining is a great application for the ShovelSense Underground system thanks to the rock heterogeneity and flexibility associated with waste and ore stockpiles , but we see this system as having potential across the entire underground space ,” More said .
“ What started as a way of making diversion decisions in the pit based on grade with ShovelSense has evolved into an offering that provides new datasets focused on downstream operations , particularly in the flotation circuit ,” Jeff More says
year product development agreement has already seen PT-FI roll out what More refers to as “ ShovelSense Underground 3.0 ” at the block cave mine in batch operations , with the next step seeing the mining company use the unit in continuous operations . At the same time , MineSense has been progressing the product development for this XRF-based solution in British Columbia , at New Gold ’ s New Afton copper-gold mine – also a block cave operation .
Refinements to the sensor ‘ head ’ and shutter system – used to deal with the wet conditions experienced underground – have now been installed on units fitted on Caterpillar loaders running at both operations , with plans to move to
IMA conveying plant-scale ore sorting potential
Having already successfully made an impact with its Fast Conveyor Analyzer ( FCA ) after the crusher in open-pit mining operations , IMA Engineering is looking for other entry points across mining where a conveyor-based sensor can add value .
The XRF based FCA system benefits from sensing intervals as small as 10 seconds , allowing greater accuracy in low-grade bulk sorting or sensing applications , or potentially higher throughput analysis in less gradeconstrained ones .
The company ’ s FCAs have been used across the Americas , Africa and Europe , successfully analysing orebodies containing iron ore , copper , nickel and other metals . They are also being used in heap leach operations where the ability to measure not only grade , but also carbonaterelated metrics could be used for optimising reagent use in the agglomeration process .
Ilpo Auranen , Chairman of IMA , believes there

GOLD

PREMIUM QUALITY ON-BELT ELEMENTAL ANALYSER FOR MINERALS
�����������������������������
��������������������������������� ������������������������������ ���������������������������� customisation module .
Website : www . scantech . com . au Email : sales @ scantech . com . au