Bucyrus is now offering turn-key electrical upgrade solutions for all Bucyrus shovels and draglines.
Drawing on its established AC technology acumen, the company says it is leading the way in providing AC Active Front End/Insulated-Gate Bipolar Transistor (AFE/IGBT) AC Helper Drives to Bucyrus equipment owners with existing DC rotating equipped machines.
The company recently completed the electrical upgrade of a Bucyrus 8200 dragline at the Wesfarmers Curragh property in Australia.
This 8200 model dragline was the first of its kind to be equipped with AC Helper Drives to the existing hoist and drag DC motions, and has been operating successfully since late April 2009.
Upgrading electrical systems with AC AFE/IGBT AC Helper Drives and AC motors, as was done on the Bucyrus 8200 model dragline at Wesfarmers Curragh, is superior to the more common method of adding DC generating capacity and/or DC Helper Drives for electrical upgrades, and has been proven to increase a machine’s productivity and availability.
Each Bucyrus machine considered for an AC upgrade is assessed on an individual basis by Bucyrus personnel, taking mine plan and machine design into account.
With mine plan information and data in hand, along with existing mechanical and electrical data specific to the machine being evaluated, Bucyrus calculates the machine’s base-line productivity.