Understanding the Different Types of Mining Equipment

In 2020, US mines produced around $82.3 billion in minerals. Mining is one of the most crucial components of modern society because mined minerals are used in just about every product used by consumers. Half of the nation's energy comes from mined products like coal or uranium. To support this huge demand, it's important to use the right mining equipment for the job. In this article, we'll tell you the most efficient mining equipment for different types of mining and how to get the best deals out there. Keep reading to learn more.

In 2020, US mines produced around $82.3 billion in minerals.

Mining is one of the most crucial components of modern society because mined minerals are used in just about every product used by consumers. Half of the nation's energy comes from mined products like coal or uranium.

To support this huge demand, it's important to use the right mining equipment for the job. In this article, we'll tell you the most efficient mining equipment for different types of mining and how to get the best deals out there.

Keep reading to learn more.

Types of Mining and the Equipment They Use

Mining happens underground and on the surface. Depending on the material that is being mined as well as the environment, miners use different types of equipment and mining techniques.

But no matter how miners gather materials, there are typically three steps involved:

1. Extraction: the process of digging, drilling, or blasting to take materials out of the mine site
2. Material handling the sorting and loading of materials to go to a processing plant or a waste area
3. Material processing this step involves any processing of the material, including crushing, grinding, refining, separating, or smelting the material into a final product

Let's take a deeper look at the two different types of mining.

Surface Mining

Surface mining produces 97% of non-fuel materials mined. This method extracts any materials that are closer to the surface.

There are three methods used to mine surface materials:

1. Quarrying
2. Open-pit mining
3. Strip mining

Quarrying usually involves cutting blocks of hard stone used for ornamental purposes. For example, granite is mined and used for building. However, it can also refer to crushing stone and sand or extracting gravel.

Open-pit mining digs a large pit into the earth so that miners can extract material for materials like silver. tools like explosives or rotary drills are often used in this process.

Strip mining involves extracting thin layers of coal from the earth's surface.

Underground Mining

Some valuable materials, like ore, minerals, and metals are deep underground and require different techniques and industrial equipment to reach them.

This digging might go through hard or soft rock, each needing different types of tools to get through and extract the material.

There are three different types of underground mining:

1. Room and pillar mining
2. Retreat mining
3. Blast mining

In room and pillar mining, miners will form pillars to support a makeshift ceiling as they continue to dig underground to get to the material. This sometimes uses a continuous mining system to extract material as well.

Retreat mining is similar to room and pillar mining, but this method will remove the pillars to retrieve as much material as possible.

Lastly, blast mining involves explosives to open mining space and loosen the rock in underground mines.

Mining Equipment Types

Because mining involves so many different tasks and materials, there are several different types of equipment required. Let's take a look at the different types and learn what each of them does.

Mining Drills

Mining drills are the backbone of any mining operation.

To mine for valuable materials, the first step is to dig into the earth and place explosives into the holes. These create high-pressure shockwaves, allowing the rock to break so that miners can dig further.

Mining drills are crucial in making accurate holes quickly and efficiently.

Earthmovers

A significant amount of excess waste materials and rocks build up in the mining process. Continuously clearing the digging site is an important task. This is where earthmovers come in.

These are large, powerful machines that can move huge amounts of debris and dirt away from the mining site at the ground level. If you don't have an earthmover, the excess materials would pile up at the site, making the mining operation incredibly difficult.

These can include regular dump trucks that have open beds and can drop materials off at specific sites or heavy-duty haul trucks that carry a large volume of materials.

Crushing Equipment

Before earthmovers can transport away excess materials, they need to be crushed into dust first.

As miners continue to dig into the ground, they leave large amounts of rubble that have to be made into a transportable form. Larger boulders are inefficient to transport to other sites, so crushing equipment breaks them down.

Crushing machinery works together with excavators to load the large boulders into the machine and fall into a chamber to crush them. After being crushed, miners transport them out of the excavator track and into a pile.

Earthmovers will pick them up from here and move them onsite, leaving the mining site clear of excess debris.

Underground Loader

Lots of debris build up underground as well. After miners create strategic explosions to clear the way in a tunnel, there is a lot of rubble that needs to be moved around. To do this, miners use underground loaders to pick up the material and carry them to an unloading point.

These loaders are much lower to the ground than a loading truck or earthmover so that they can fit in harder-to-reach spaces and tunnels.

Although they are smaller, they are still strong enough to carry tons of waste material where they need to go.

Longwall Mining

This process typically happens deep underground when mining for coal. A sophisticated system of interconnected pieces of equipment is used so that miners can work in a safe and efficient environment.

This system usually consists of three parts:

1. A plow that spans the longwall and cuts the wall of coal
2. A conveyor belt that catches the coal that is cut and transports it to the crusher
3. Roof support systems hold the structure together to keep miners safe

These longwall mining sites are usually around 800 feet wide and 5 to 10 feet high.

Continuous Miners

Continuous miners are huge pieces of mining equipment that can cut through soft minerals and coal. They have a large rotating steel drum with sharp teeth so that they can cut and grind material in a mining site.

Nowadays, these continuous miners are usually electricity-powered and remote-controlled.

Roof Bolters

Safety is a top priority for any mine site. An essential tool used to keep a site secure is a roof bolter.

Miners use these to secure the roof of a mining tunnel. This helps prevent a cave-in that could injure or even bury miners that are working underground.

It does this by keeping the roof of the mining secure and installing a strong safety net to catch any debris if it collapses.

Blasting Tools

Blasting tools refer to many different types of explosive detonating material. In order to reach materials hidden by several layers of hard rock, it is necessary to blow them up.

In the past, miners would often light a fuse and time how long it would take to detonate the charges. This was incredibly dangerous and not very effective.

In modern mining, workers use a variety of blasting tools to detonate charges from remote locations. This gives them much more control over the detonation process so that they can get consistent results.

Electric Rope Shovel

Another essential tool for material loading operations is the electric rope shovel. These powerful tools can carry a payload of up to 120 tons.

Their design allows them to traverse rough terrain, allowing them to move from one sector of the mining site to another. They have very fast loading times. They also boast of having the lowest cost-per-ton in the mining industry.

Mining Graders

Mining graders are pieces of equipment that have several different important tasks at a mining site.

First, they keep roads on the site clear. With so many large pieces of heavy machinery that transport cargo and material from one sector to another, it's normal for waste to fall out of trucks and get in the way.

A mining grader uses a blade in the front of the vehicle to clear out rocks so that other pieces of equipment don't have to drive over them. Not only does this make everyone else's jobs easier, but it increases the lifespan of other pieces of equipment and protects their tires.

A mining grader can also clear out terrain during rainy or windy storms that can affect how other machines work.

These have a huge effect on the productivity of a mining site.

Get the Best Equipment Deals For Your Mining Operation

Now that you understand the different types of machinery, the next step is buying mining equipment.

In order to find top-quality equipment at the best prices, you need to have a trustworthy, experienced partner. For that, look no further than Fuelled. Our business model and technology platform allow only the best equipment to be sold at best-in-industry prices.

Check out our listings today!