Mining Equipment 101: The Tools of The Trade

Mining Equipment 101: The Tools of The Trade

Mining is considered as one of the toughest occupations in the world. It is hard, manual labor that subjects workers to challenging conditions. They work in hot, dark, and often dangerous conditions, but the work they do is vital to hundreds of industries and manufacturing plants. Without miners, there won’t be coal, minerals, and other valuable resources.

To help miners do their jobs quickly and safely, special equipment like ATV sprayers for sale are used on site. These are powerful enough to move rocks and earth and even prevent accidents from happening at the mine. Here are a few of them:

Excavators

Miners often use steam shovels and traditional shovels to remove and break the earth. Nowadays, miners rely on excavators. This is a mobile mining vehicle with regular wheels used to get rid of dirt. They have a rotating platform, from which can be found an arm hinged with a bucket or scoop type mechanism for digging.

Drills

Those who work in mines and extract oils and natural gas often depend on drills to get to the underground mineral deposits before they pipe the resources out to the surface above. These are often used by mineral and coal miners.

Continuous Miners

The continuous miners are equipped with big, rotating teeth and are usually made with tungsten carbide tips. The coal miners in the subterranean rely on these machines to scrape coal out.

Draglines

Also called dragline excavators, these are gigantic machines that many miners rely on to drag and carry away dirt and help reveal the coal and mineral deposits found underneath. They are the biggest machines on earth, and it can get rid of several tons of materials in a single hauling.

Rock Duster

excavator on the field

The rock dusters are made up of pressurised equipment that coal miners utilise to spray inert mineral dust on highly flammable coal dust. These prevent accidental explosions and fire.

Roof Bolters

These are huge machines that are powered by hydraulics and used to force bolts in high-level areas as roofs. Miners use them to help support and enforce runner roofs and prevent ground collapse when they work underground.

Longwall Miners

Aside from the continuous miners’ tool, the long wall miners are used by miners to help remove big, rectangular parts of coal instead of scraping them from the bed in pieces. The continuous miners can have several cutting shearers and a hydraulic system that is self-rising to support mine shaft ceilings as coal are being mined.

Loaders

Wheel loaders come in various names. There is a 4-wheel tractor that has a big bucket loader used to help scoop materials from the ground, for example. This piece of mining equipment is used to remove mounds of soil from one location to another. Some use them for cleaning out debris or to help level the ground in an area. Loaders can vary in weight, dump reach, and bucket capacity. You can compare them in terms of sizes.

Shuttle Cars and Scoops

These cars are used to transport coal from one coal bed to another wishing the mine. They are electric powered shuttle units. They can use standard scoops or haul vehicles to transfer loads as fast as they can.

Mining equipment comes in all shapes and sizes and is used for mine safety, convenience, and speed in extraction. Specialized equipment is used for a variety of tasks and roles for improved efficiency. It’s best to know which to use.

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