Doofor rock drills excelling on Mantis face drilling rigs in South Africa

Rock drills major Doofor Inc and Fabchem Group of Johannesburg, South Africa are working together to offer the Southern Africa mining market functional drilling equipment. The Fabchem Group is the official distributor of the Doofor products in Sub-Saharan Africa. Fabchem, through its subsidiary, Conax Machine Solutions, manufactures, refurbishes and repairs roof bolters and hydraulic rock drills, with its flagship product being the Mantis Roof Bolter. The Mantis is offered with a Doofor DF530S hydraulic rock drill.

Recently, a client of Fabchem, in coal mining, achieved excellent results when they used the Mantis equipped with a Doofor rock drill, for developing through a dyke (hard rock). They had started the project using jack hammers, but it soon became clear that the project was unfeasible due to slow production rates. They were achieving an average penetration rate of 0.11 m/min or 18 minutes for every 2 m hole. They then tried another hydraulic rock drill, which achieved a penetration rate of 0.44 m/min or 4.5 min for every 2.0m hole, but reliability was poor. Fabchem then offered the client a Doofor DF530S rock drill mounted on the Mantis machine and it was a huge success. They achieved a penetration rate of 0.80 m/min, which meant they could now drill a 2 m round in 2.5 minutes, with excellent equipment availability.

At these drilling production rates, the project became viable and the client was very satisfied. These results were also shared at a meeting of the South African Colliery Managers Association in 2017. The mine has recently ordered another Mantis Roof Bolter/Face Drill, which is both diesel and electric powered, complete with percussion feed frame and Doofor DF530S rock drill mounted on it, for delivery at the end of June 2018.

The Doofor drifters are of very high quality, offer high production rates and are cost effective. “We at Doofor are pleased to work with a manufacturing company such as Fabchem. With them we can offer strong technical support and spare parts service for our products in demanding underground conditions.”, explains Kalle Kuusento of Doofor Inc. “We see a lot of potential for growth through customer satisfaction when they see the economy and reliability of our products.”