BUSINESS
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Babcock
Babcock provides comprehensive technical support for some of the world’ s leading heavy-duty machinery brands, including Volvo CE and Terex Trucks.
Robyn Grimsley
Babcock also offers its customers a rebuild option, which is specifically geared towards the mining sector where machinery rapidly clocks up high production hours. Once the warranty on a machine has lapsed, customers may have the option of refurbishing it rather than trading it in or buying new. After refurbishing, Babcock parts and services extend the warranty on the machine for an additional 12 months.
CASE Construction Equipment
Another company that is directing some of its focus to maintenance and refurbishing is CASE Construction Equipment distributer CSE Equipment.
Ross Collard, who joined CSE as managing director earlier this year, is proud of the company’ s workshop.“ I ' ve always had this very strong bond to workshops, because that’ s where I started out. And I see this as an area with huge potential. The service department is one of my pet projects, and it’ s a massive part of our offering. Since I’ ve come on board at CSE, we’ ve realigned the workshop— we’ ve spent money, we’ ve bought equipment, we’ ve revamped the workshop— and we’ ve got a facility that’ s just world class. We can do full component rebuilds, including engines, transmissions and hydraulics, and we can do hydraulic testing, resprays, and refurbishing— everything in-house.”
Collard is quick to add that not only the facilities are world class.“ We also have incredibly skilled people. I think about 80 % of our mechanics are actually home-grown; they all trained in-house. In addition to revamping the workshop, we’ ve hired after-sales reps to focus on the service and parts side of our offering, so we can offer customers everything they need.
We offer full after-hours parts and servicing, and we’ re fortunate to have a distribution centre across the road, so we know parts are available.”
CASE has a remote machine management system called SiteWatch, which monitors machine performance, among its other functions. Collard explains that the CASE machines are sold with service contracts, and SiteWatch enables CSE to schedule services and maintenance.“ At 250 hours, for example, we can contact the customer and tell them that their machine is due for a service. We’ ve never really put an emphasis on this before, but we want to start offering this service and we are currently bringing in the first batches of machines with SiteWatch fitted, although it is a huge undertaking to get on track with so many machines.”
Komatsu Mining Corp.
Komatsu Mining Corp.( previously Joy Global) is another OEM that places heavy emphasis on machine maintenance. The mining equipment manufacturer has a state-of-the-art distribution and service centre at its Wadeville plant that undertakes maintenance, repairs, rebuilds, and refurbishing of all types for all of its equipment. The 8 500m 2 full-service manufacturing facility has high-density covered storage and offers 24 / 7 turnaround, running two shifts of disassembly, assembly, component fabrication, welding, and machining operations. The company’ s processes also include internal inspections and verifications, exit audits for final quality inspections, and commissioning audits.
“ Our workshop has a full manufacturing capability, and thus we are able to manufacture equipment from scratch, such as turning a
flat plate into a full frame for a shuttle car or continuous miner, and do repairs of all types, from basic maintenance right through to full refurbishments and reconditioning of equipment,” says Marc de Chalain, business development manager for Africa for Komatsu Mining Corp.“ We also offer the same services for the various components, including electric motors and hydraulics.”
Komatsu Mining’ s engineering team comprises around 70 technical staff with qualifications covering a broad spectrum of engineering disciplines based in South Africa, with an additional 200 + global technical staff for additional support. The centre’ s capabilities include new manufactured units, as well as repair and remanufacturing of gearcase cutter drums, continuous miners, shuttle cars, roof bolters, drums and chains, shovel dippers, and motor repairs. The Wadeville facility also has 3-D printing capabilities, enabling the company to do rapid prototyping and even print models for customers when required.
The company also has a JoySmart Services Centre in eMalahleni that monitors all telematic data from its machines, and houses its oil and vibration analysis labs, as well as its training centre. Cutting-edge hardware and software systems allow the company to collect and analyse data from applications, including strain measurement, vibration monitoring, oil analysis, thermal photography and imaging, electroscopic measurement, metallurgical analysis, and current and voltage measuring. This allows Komatsu Mining to offer the best possible service to its customers. The Centre’ s warehouse carries all of the company’ s CEP stock units to ensure lower delivery response time, while on-site
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JULY 2017