During the recent In-Pit Crushing and Conveying (IPCC) Virtual event on February 5, TAKRAF’s Chief Mine Planning Engineer, Rico Neumann gave the most detailed review yet on the company’s progress with its 55 Mt/y IPCC system project at the Lebedinsky (Lebedinskij) GOK iron ore operations of Metalloinvest, one of Russia’s and the world’s leading producers of iron ore products.

In 2017, TAKRAF received the EPCM contract for the IPCC system at the mine, which is located near Gubkin in the Belgorod region, around 500 km south of Moscow. It has been operating since the 1970s and boasts iron ore reserves of close to 4 billion tonnes.

The new IPCC system is under construction and will replace the existing railroad ore transport system out of the pit. It consists of:

• 2 x semi-mobile designed primary crushing plants with apron feeders
• 2 x crusher discharge conveyors
• 2 x acceleration conveyors
• 2 x pit ramps – overland conveyors bridging 280 m of topographical height
• 4 x plant conveyors
• 1 x stockyard feed and reclaim conveyor
• 1 x bucket-wheel stacker reclaimer
• 1 x mobile loading hopper with apron feeder at stockyard

The IPCC system, including a 2 x 130,000 t stockyard has to feed the processing plant with 55 Mt of iron ore per year. As a result, each of the primary crushing plants, as well as all of the conveyors were designed with a capacity of 5,500 t/h, except the stockyard feed and reclaim conveyor, which were designed with a capacity of 8,000 t/h. A special feature of the system is its high level of redundancy, which is realised through the twin arrangement of crushers and conveyors, continuously adjustable distribution chutes, at almost all transfer towers and two reversible conveyors to feed and reclaim the back-up stockyard.

The entire system was designed for the harsh winter conditions, as well as including various intelligent features to facilitate maintenance across all areas. The system also includes various elements catering to automated operation and control, including a self-propelled TAKRAF maintenance cart on the 14.5° inclined pit ramp conveyor for an efficient conveyor maintenance solution.

IPCC systems build operational resilience as well as reducing opex, increasing safety and providing environmental benefits. With this project, TAKRAF says it has entrenched itself as a leading global partner for customer specific, sophisticated and reliable mining & materials handling solutions. A video of another IPCC project completed in Kazakhstan can be viewed at https://www.takraf.com/expertise/in-pit-crushing-and-conveying-ipcc