The innovative heavy duty, lightweight body is produced by DT HiLoad Australia, one of 18 businesses that make up Ausdrill.

Ausdrill’s manufacturing segment reported a 6% increase in revenue to $A72.9 million for the six months to December 31, which it attributed to sales of the Hercules.

“This segment recorded a small improvement in revenues due to increased sales of lightweight truck trays to the mining sector,” Ausdrill said.

The tray can be used with nearly any dump truck body and in hard rock as well as with less aggressive materials, which DT Australia chief executive officer Richard Lang said gave the Hercules a leg up over its competition.

“As far as we know this is the only lightweight body working in hard rock,” Lang told MiningNewsPremium.net.

“Again that is possible because of the clever design and the millions of dollars of development work.”

The fact the tray can be used across different materials means it has become popular in with contractors.

In a coal environment the DT Australia team is just replacing some 10-year-old Hercules trays that put in 60,000 truck operating hours, while hard rock takes a higher toll with trays needing to be replaced at around 50,000 hours.

The design of the Hercules is what makes it so unique: the lighter material offers as much strength as a traditional tray while the curved design is more flexible and forgiving than a square rigid body.

“We would say it is equally strong if not stronger than an original body,” sales and marketing manager Steve Turner said.

“Not that we recommend it but they can take a fair bit of punishment.

“You can belt them accidently with a bucket for instance and the body will flex – it’ll bounce around a bit, you’ll get a bit of a ding in it but you’ll find it’ll come back into shape without any issues.”

The Hercules was invented in Chile and DT Australia began importing the dump truck body kits from South America in 2003.

In 2010, the company acquired manufacturing equipment to make the bodies completely in the Forrestfield workshop in Western Australia.

The following year Ausdrill purchased the remaining share of the operation from the Chilean inventors for full Australian ownership while DT Australia secured the patents to the body.

Though Lang and his team think the Hercules can almost sell itself, mines and contractors are sometimes reluctant to invest in new products and the cost-saving of using the Hercules tray is a major selling point.

“In the current environment where mines are trying to manage their costs down, we feel that senior mining executives should be looking at the bodies on their haulage fleet to squeeze out some economic benefits through haulage cost reductions,” he said.

DT Australia is capable of making around 200 Hercules trays a year, turning out a single tray in six weeks from start to finish.

“The payback period for the investment is very short, sometimes several months and usually less than a year,” Lang explained.

“This is achieved through increased payload on every truckload, which could be several tonnes moved for every 40-minute truck cycle over 6000 hours per year.”

In a fleet of 10 trucks, companies could choose to increase production by 10% or reduce the fleet size by one truck – a significant saving in either case.

Based on a site running 10 trucks for 20 hours a day with three cycles an hour, the Hercules would add nearly 14,000 additional tonnes per day.

While the company advertises the Hercules in industry magazines and at mining shows, Lang believes conversation has been a key to success.

“We find that word of mouth and repeat business have been our major allies,” he said.

“Once a customer buys one, they buy more.”

One of DT’s greatest success stories is KCGM, which completely switched over to the Hercules body over the course of four years.

KCGM declined to comment for this story.

Newcrest Mining also made several repeat purchases for its Telfer gold mine in the Pilbara.

“Newcrest is currently using 14 Hercules trays at our Telfer operations,” a company spokesman said.

“We are considering purchasing additional trays in the future.”

Despite the push for companies to keep expenses down, Lang said the company was cautiously optimistic about the future.

“Our sales levels are holding up and we expect to be on target for the year,” he said.

“Clearly the economic environment is cooler than it was so we have to work harder for future business.”

Ausdrill shares were up 1.7% to $2.94 in morning trading.