SA NEWS
Hytec Services Africa has
launched its mine site-based
containerised hose workshops to
provide a comprehensive on site
hose and fittings service to its
mining customers across Africa.
The workshops are set up
on site in refurbished and
branded shipping containers
varying in size from 20 to 40
feet and provide hose and
fittings services, while enabling
Hytec to supply its range of
hydraulic services on a mine
site – effectively functioning as
an on-site mobile branch.
Depending on the
requirements of the mine
and the urgency in providing
services, Hytec can provide a
workshops are manufactured
and readily available fully fitted
in Johannesburg to ensure
speedy mobilisation and
delivery times.
“The workshop configuration
depends on the mine’s
requirements,” explains Charlie
Harrison, Africa Mining
Services and Operations
Manager, HSA. “Mines that
require services beyond
hydraulic hose and fittings may
need additional containers to
accommodate filter, pump or
cylinder stock. It may also be
appropriate to add an office
using a 20-foot container. Each
container, and the configuration
in setting up two or more
Hytec’s mobile workshops
launched
Hytec's containerised workshop.
infrastructure, the container
itself becomes the Hytec
country base. “We ensure that
the workshop configuration
is sufficiently flexible to
accommodate all hydraulic
components and services to the
mines requirements,” he says.
“If, for instance, the mine is in
a remote and inaccessible area
like many in East, West and
North Africa, the containers
and their configuration need
to allow for supplementary
stockholdings due to extended
and difficult supply routes.”
Under normal circumstances
a contract for this type of
service and product offering
is between two and three
years, and this is where the
advantage of having a ‘mobile’
workshop becomes apparent.
“It is relatively easy to pack up and pick
up the container for relocation to another
mine site, which can be done fairly
quickly.”
start-up workshop with stock
in a short turnaround time to
ensure that hose replacement
services begin the moment the
workshop and stock arrives
on the mine site. Start-up
containers, are custom-designed
to each mine’s requirements.”
He points out that if a
Hytec container workshop is
based in a country without
an established Hytec branch
“If a contract is not renewed,
for whatever reason,” Harrison
explains, “it is relatively easy
to pack up and pick up the
container for relocation to
another mine site, which can be
done fairly quickly.”
Hytec has already submitted
a containerised workshop
tender to a mining house in the
DRC, with tenders for the same
underway with mining houses
in Zimbabwe, Zambia and
Ghana. “Through the Bosch
Rexroth Africa expansion
initiative, full Hytec branch
operations have been opened
in East Africa in Kenya, West
Africa in Ghana and we are
working with Bosch Rexroth
Morocco, which also covers
Tunisia, Algeria and Egypt,”
says Harrison.
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