Trelleborg’s Performer Ceramic hose cuts maintenance at underground iron ore mine

Standing up to harsh grinding and comminution processes, the Performer Ceramic hoses are still performing after one year, lengthening the quarterly maintenance cycle required for previous hoses.

Ludovic Dumoulin, Market Segment Manager for industrial hoses within Trelleborg’s fluid handling operation, said: “Keeping production at the extraordinary pace required in today’s mines means that each link in the processing chain has to be extraordinarily strong. The Performer Ceramic hose is like nothing else on the market. It offers extended life compared to rubber hoses and is 60% lighter than conventional ceramic hoses.

“The development process for the hose took four years and it is now proving it’s worth in real mining situations. In the largest underground iron ore mine in the world, after one-year in operation it is still going strong. In fact, our engineers confirm that the mine’s Performer Ceramic hoses probably have a lot of life in them yet – at least another year and a half before they need to be swapped out; ten times longer than the quarterly average.

“Cutting maintenance intervals from once a quarter for standard hoses to once a year with Performer Ceramic hoses can obviously have a dramatic effect on the cost efficiency of a mine, significantly lowering total cost of ownership.”

In addition, installing the Performer Ceramic hose is easy. The hose can be cut in the same way as an ordinary rubber hose without using a ceramic saw, while Bloc-End couplings provide simple fitment. Special diamond-shaped tiles have a bending radius tighter than a rubber hose at just 200 mm for a 50 mm hose and 1300 mm for a 200 mm hose, which is roughly one-fifth of the space required by a conventional solution.

The Performer Ceramic hose patented design is 92% ceramic with an embedded steel helix. Its operating temperature range is between -30°C and +70°C.

Read the article online at: https://www.globalminingreview.com/product-news/14052020/trelleborgs-performer-ceramic-hose-cuts-maintenance-at-underground-iron-ore-mine/