At MINExpo 2024 in Las Vegas, Nevada, Komatsu released a series of product and service advancements.
Power Agnostic 930E haul truck
The Komatsu Power Agnostic 930E rigid-frame haul truck accommodates a wide range of current and future power sources, including diesel, battery, and hydrogen fuel cells.
The haul truck is built on Komatsu’s modular power-agnostic platform, enabling fleets to start with conventional diesel engines and gradually transition to cleaner energy sources as needed, including utilization of trolley assist for diesel or as one of the future dynamic charging solutions for battery trucks to reduce fuel consumption and emissions.
“This truck represents a key component of our decarbonization strategy and will provide customers operational flexibility in reaching their sustainability goals when the opportunity is right for them,” said Dan Funcannon, SVP of surface haulage, in a statement.
Modular ecosystem
Building upon its Dispatch fleet management system, the new Modular ecosystem is an expanding set of interconnected platforms and products designed to simplify existing workflows.
“One of our customers’ biggest challenges is being able to get the full value out of the data sets they own,” said Jason Fletcher, SVP of mining technology solutions, in a statement. “The Modular ecosystem is that entry point for a mine operation to have one place to gather operational information for every activity that's going on across their mine site. It’s our path forward to help optimize mining operations at the machine, mine site, and enterprise levels.”
With its open architecture design, the Modular ecosystem offers the ability to create a “single source of truth” for common data used across their mining operations, including data from connected Komatsu products as well as third-party vendors and other connected equipment. Access to all connected operational data allows customers to streamline decision making and support remote decision making. The Modular ecosystem will also allow stakeholders to securely share their data with partners of their choice.
The first new offerings are:
- Simulate: Visualize and analyze scenarios to improve decision making across the shift
- Roadways: Keep road systems up-to-date with little user intervention
- Replenish: Refuel and recharge mining equipment while minimizing impact to production
- Look Ahead: Execute multi-objective mine plans and take optimization to the next level
Teleoperation
Two separate teleoperation advancements for its blasthole drills and mining dozers allow operators to manage heavy machinery from an off-site location.
Read also: The case for remote control in construction
Non-line-of-sight drilling is now available for the blasthole drill line. It allows operators to remotely control drilling operations from off-site locations within the fleet’s network, offering increased flexibility and safety. The automation technology is designed to reduce operational variability, leading to improvements in blasthole quality and fragmentation through precise execution of drill patterns. Komatsu has remote control dozers working in Brazil.
Dozers now have available Modular ProVision machine guidance with automatic blade control, offering precise and reliable remote operation. Komatsu teleremote dozers allow operators to maintain productive operations from a distance without sacrificing control or efficiency.
By leveraging the automatic blade control technology, Komatsu has successfully mitigated the latency issues typically associated with teleoperation, ensuring consistent productivity without compromise.
Primary benefits identified at customer sites include the complete removal of operators from hazardous zones, increased production in high-risk environments, and the opportunity for less experienced operators to reach proficiency in a shorter time period. In addition, teleoperation offers training capabilities directly at the console and reduced downtime for shift changes or breaks.
