What’s New JUMBOS FOR NARROW MINES

There’s good news in the mine equipment field for Canadian gold miners.

Historically, Finland-based Tamrock has tested its new drill jumbos in Scandinavia. Only when the machines were modified and improved, were they released to the rest of the mining world in marketable form. But now, for the first time, the company is testing a new, narrow- vein mining machine in two Canadian hardrock gold mines. The new electro-hydraulic units will go head- to-head with the only other drill jumbo available to Canadian mines which mine orebodies as narrow as 4 ft wide. That unit is manufactured in France and distributed in Canada by Teledyne Canada Mining Products. The Tamrock machine is a narrow, one-boom jumbo based on components used widely on other Tamrock drill rigs. It is called the Micromatic H 102. This particular model, which is only 1.2 m wide, has been designed specifically for mining narrow (4-ft) vein-type gold deposits — the type that abounds in this country. Typically these deposits are mined using pneumatic jacklegs and stopers, but the many new mines just coming into production are looking to mechanize their operations with high-capacity machines such as drill jumbos.

One unit mounted on a rigid, rubber-wheeled carrier, is being tested at Lac Minerals’ Doyon mine in Quebec and another, mounted on an articulated rubber-wheeled carrier, is being tested at the Tartan Lake mine in Manitoba, operated by Granges Exploration. Both units are equipped with the proven he 322 hydraulic drifter. There are only five other Tamrock machines like these in the world — one in Spain, one in Italy, one in England and two in Australia, according to Tom Evans of Tamrock Canada in Copper Cliff, Ont. All are working in hardrock applications.

During a 2-3-month test period Tamrock engineers will decide what, if anything, has to be modified on the machines.

Questions about the performance and versatility plus the general operator and mechanical acceptance of the machines will be answered to the satisfaction of both Tamrock and the two mining companies involved. (Questions like: How easy is it to use automatic parallelism? and so on.) The results of the evaluation period should be known shortly.

The other narrow drill jumbo, already available to the Canadian mining market, is assembled and serviced by Teledyne Canada Mining Products. This company’s microdrill is just 85 cm wide. Called the cmm 500 he, it is a one-boom unit manufactured in France and assembled and serviced in Thornbury, Ont. It is also equipped with an electro-hydraulic drill, the 24 rh, manufactured by cmm of France. The entire drilling unit has been proven for about four years. Two units are operating in Cliff Mining’s uranium mine near Carswell Lake, Sask., and another machine is on order.