Determining Constraints and Equipment Fleet Configuration with MineTwin

Determining Constraints and Equipment Fleet Configuration with MineTwin

Determining constraints and equipment fleet configuration for one of the biggest open cast coal mines in Southern Africa. We used MineTwin to create a detailed simulation model of coal mine operations that was used to answer the following questions:

  • How many dozers, excavators, and trucks are required to fulfill the plan?
  • Is a buffer of ore needed in front of the conveyor? If so, what should its size be?

Period: July 2021 – October 2021
Industry: Mining
Client / Partner: One of coal mining companies/ Tomahee, Minfo

Project objective

Determining constraints and equipment fleet configuration for one of the biggest open cast coal mines in Southern Africa

The main stages of work and characteristics of the model

  • Definition of the problem on a series of off-site sessions with the mine’s personnel and implementation partner
  • Creating the simulation model in MineTwin by configuring it and programming the client-specific coordination logic
  • Validation the model to make sure it correctly captures volumes, speeds and mining rates
  • Performing experimentation with the model to obtain the numeric results addressing the business challenges

Model input data

  • Geometric and mining-geological features of mines
  • Schedules, technological operations execution order and duration
  • Technical characteristics and limitations of equipment and transport

The main structural elements of the model

  • Input data file of scenario in MS Excel format
  • Simulation model on the MineTwin platform

Model output data

  • Coal mining volume for each scenario
  • Utilization of equipment types
  • Achievable mining volumes for every size of buffer in front of conveyor transportation system
  • Number of excavators, dozers and trucks required to reliably meet the mining plan

Project result

  • It was determined, that 7 dozers, 6 trucks and 3 exavators are required to fulfill the plan
  • It was additionally determined, that a buffer of ore is needed in front of the conveyor. The size of the buffer shuold be at least 10 000 tons