Electric motor, mechanical and electrical motion- control products manufacturer Regal Beloit (CMG) is in the final stage of delivering and commissioning 29 power packs for a modular mobile plant at an industrial company’s cement quarry in Polokwane, Limpopo, says Regal Beloit (CMG) gearbox specialist Jeremy Schlemmer.

Each power pack consists of an industrial gearbox, mounted with a low-voltage 22 kW electric motor, he notes.

The power packs are used on the surge bins, the ground conveyors and the slew drives at the plant.

The design stage of the project, which began in April, required Regal Beloit (CMG) to deliver a power transmission solutions package to be used in quarrying for making crush, explains Schlemmer.

At the plant, a tipper truck pours the material into a jaw crusher, after which surge bins feed the material into dual cone crushers. A necklace of ground conveyors move the material to different locations where slew drives are used to stack the crush.

The modular design requirements, which were needed to allow for easy transport and disassembly at the site, were a challenge, states Schlemmer.

To enhance ease of maintenance and disassembly for the power packs, Regal Beloit (CMG) used a shrink disk shaft mounting arrangement. Shrink disks were used to clamp the gear units to the shafts, which enabled the company to eliminate keyways on the gear box pulley and the shaft head pulley.

Regal Beloit (CMG) was also required to comply with stringent Canadian specifications, notes Schlemmer, but he enthuses that, despite the challenges, the project is progressing on time and within budget.

He further points out that the company has a range of parallel shaft-mounted gearboxes, all of which are modular, adding that the gearboxes are hardy, using only three ratios and simple mechanisms, such as rebelts and pulleys, to change speed.

Big Deals
Sales and marketing director Hilton Fortmann tells Mining Weekly that Regal Beloit (CMG) has been active with several other business ventures in the past six months.

He says the company was nominated in September as the electric motors supplier for a mining company with operations in Mali, Burkina Faso, Tanzania and Kenya.

Further, in March this year, Regal Beloit (CMG) launched its own scraper winch motor, of which about 200 have been sold to date, highlights Fortmann.

Designed according to stringent specifications to endure aggressive conditions, the scraper winch motor is used to recover material after blasting by scooping the blasted material within a mine using two converging paddles.

Fortmann states that the motor is made out of robust fabricated steel and designed to dissipate the heat generated from its aggressive application. It is about 1.1 m in length, but it is round, so that it can be rolled rather than carried, he explains.

The scraper winch motor is available in 37 kW, 55 kW and 75 kW models.

Meanwhile, in August, Regal Beloit (CMG) opened a repair facility in Middelburg, Mpumalanga. Coal miner Exxaro and mining major Glencore, which have mining operations near Middelburg, use Regal Beloit’s products, states Fortmann.

The company also opened a branch in Rustenburg, in the North West, in September to service the mining industry in that region.

Opening repair facilities and additional branches are measures that Regal Beloit (CMG) is implementing to deal with low points in the economy by creating sustainable partnerships with the mining industry, concludes Fortmann.