Full Steam Ahead

FULL STEAM AHEAD

In recent years, Reliance Hexham has been involved in the commissioning and brake testing of several Dolly Cars and Man Cars in the underground mining industry. When searching through history, it is unclear if an entire ‘Train’ had ever been brake tested as a complete assembly of vehicles. After tapping into the wider industry knowledge, no evidence was found.

PROJECT

Some of you may have already watched a blog from November 2019 where our ‘Reliance Franlane’ braking system was successfully tested on our test track. This was a very successful test and quite a comprehensive regime of testing. Since then we have multiplied that by 4 vehicles in a train assembly comprising of a 13 person Dolly Car and 3 x 28 person Man Cars as our next big commissioning projects, you can appreciate the stakes were very high.

DESIGN

The train itself was designed and manufactured by Reliance Hexham with the Reliance Franlane brake design fitted. The new and improved Reliance Franlane has solid and comprehensive engineering to back up every feature and function of the braking system. This system has highly technical data to back it up, and a failsafe design that does not rely on any other power source other than the weight of the vehicle to initiate its function. The train was tested in a drift or incline at 3.5:1 with a total full mass of 42.66T.

RESULTS

The photo below demonstrates the brake initiation point compared to where the vehicle came to complete rest within required specifications.

STOPPING POINT

The professionalism shown by both the Reliance Hexham team, the customer and other contractors involved such as electrical and hydraulics was exceptional. With safety at the forefront of everyone’s mind, the testing was SUCCESSFUL! This was also completed with no injuries and within the time frame allowed for the commissioning. This allowed the mine to get back into production as soon as possible.