Oaky Creek North has exceeded all previous shift, daily, weekly and monthly longwall production records and is well on its way to challenging the Australian annual production record held by fellow Xstrata mine Beltana in New South Wales.
Oaky North uses the Eickhoff SL750 shearer loader with IPC control technology and EiControl shearer automation.
The machine features two 620kW cutter motors on each ranging arm. The two haulage units are each equipped with 120kW AC haulage motors.
The machine has a total installed power of 1570kW.
The SL750 operates the run of face continually in shearer horizon control automation mode.
An Oaky North employee said the beauty of the system was that there was no adjustment from one shift to the next as found with manual operation, as the SL750 was in auto control and the machine operators showed consistency of control shift after shift.
Oaky North, in a 12-hour shift, produced a massive 29,642 tonnes (30,840 run-of-mine tonnes) from the longwall.
The Beltana mine previously held the 24-hour daily production record at an Australian longwall with 47,353t, and this was beaten when Oaky North achieved 56,890t (58,637t ROM).
The previous weekly and monthly longwall production records were held by Xstrata’s Newlands mine in the Bowen Basin.
Newlands produced 251,720t in a week, trounced by more than 60,000t when Oaky North achieved 312,506t (324,071t ROM).
Oaky North also hit a new monthly longwall production record with 1,146,721t mined (1,192,482t ROM) in August this year, beating the previous record by almost 200,000t.
Oaky North produces top-quality coking coal predominantly for the export market.
