Although China is the second largest coalproducing
country in the world, the geological
conditions of the country's coal seams
are not always favorable. The coal seams in
most of the existing coal-mining areas are
too deep for surface mining so about 90%
of China's total coal production is from underground
mines.
About three years ago CASAR's mining sales
and technical group began seeking a partner
in the Chinese coal industry to test our
special mining ropes. After several visits and
technical evaluations on their winding system,
Huainan Mining Industry Group, one of
the largest mining groups in China, agreed
to test our CASAR ropes at their Zhang Ji
Mine.
In the mining industry, shutting down equipment
for a week to replace ropes is extremely
costly. These maintenance breaks could
take place every year which adversely affects
the mine's profit.
It is a huge benefit to a mine to be able to
run the machines longer between changeouts.
Huainan Mining's target was to reach a
rope lifetime that enables the mine to extend
the time between scheduled rope changeouts
to two or three years. When CASAR first
met with them they could not reach year two
on our conventional or competitor's ropes so
they often changed ropes after one year to
avoid an unscheduled breakdown.