Industrea subsidiary Industrea Wadam signed the contract for the supply of the 55-tonne C9 powered low-emission machines.

Inner Mongolia is one of the major coal producing areas of China.

Industrea managing director and chief executive Robin Levison said the contract was a repeat order by Yitai for the flameproof and explosion-proof roof carriers, with the miner previously purchasing four of the same units.

The latest order will bring the total fleet of Industrea’s roof support carriers at Yitai to 16 units.

Levison said it was anticipating an increase in demand for its equipment to be deployed in China.

“We are building our service capability in our Shijiazhuang facility to accommodate an expected associated increase in orders for service and refurbishment from our large installed base of [Industrea mining equipment] in China which is now close to 150 machines,” he said.

“Given the very high utilisation rates of equipment in China, the service and refurbishment cycle is much shorter in China than Australia,” Levison said.