Since September 2020, Inner Mongolia North Hauler Joint Stock Co Ltd (NHL) has been overhauling 30 mechanical drive 91 t payload TR100 dump trucks that have been out of service for more than a year at Zijin Mining-owned Tibet Julong Copper in China. NHL formed a 10-person maintenance team to carry out the project at the Julong copper mine site which is located at an altitude of over 5,000 m.

The team overcame the difficulties of low temperature, high altitude, and lack of oxygen in the plateau area to conduct on-site evaluation of the equipment, develop a maintenance work plan and organise and arrange the works in an efficient manner. At the same time, it actively communicated with the mine owner and contractor and coordinated all efforts meaning the work was completed more than two weeks earlier than originally planned.

The Julong operation involves development of several mines with the main one being Qulong for which the 100-150,000 t/d Phase 1 of the project is set to be completed and put into production by the end of 2021. Phase 1 production will last for eight years. Some 847 Mt of ore will be mined at Cu 0.42%, Mo 0.022%. The average stripping ratio will be 0.26 t/t. After completion of Phase 1 construction, the annual production will be 165,000 t of copper and 6,200 t of molybdenum.