Tag Archives: Gillian Summers

New Australia pulley manufacturer, refurbisher sets up shop in New South Wales

New South Wales-based Brain Industries has launched a new range of custom designed conveyor pulleys including drive pulleys and non-drive pulleys for the Australia market.

Brain’s Managing Director, Gillian Summers, said its Newcastle pulley manufacturing centre will benefit a range of industries, including port facilities, underground coal mines, open-pit mines, hard-rock mines, coal loading facilities and overland conveyors.

Pulleys provide the drive and tension to move a conveyor belt – essential in the process of handling materials such as minerals, grain, packages, and even people.

“Brain has invested significantly in new equipment so that every engineering and testing activity can be carried out on site,” Summers said.

She said Brain meets the requirements of ISO 9001, with its pulley shells and end discs made from certified steel plate. Welds are full penetration ultrasonically tested and magnetic particle tested to industry standards, while all pulley weldments are thermally stress relieved.

“Our conveyor pulleys are made from high-quality Australian materials which means they are built to last and operate in tough conditions,” she said.

The pulleys will be made at Brain’s Newcastle engineering workshop, situated close by to the Hunter Valley region’s coal mines. A pulley refurbishment service will also be based there.

“Refurbishing pulleys locally can save businesses significant time and money, extending the life of important infrastructure,” Summer said. “Our refurbishment services include: complete pulley strip down and cleaning of parts; removal of old pulley lagging; non-destructive testing of the shaft and shell; re-machining; re-lagging; re-assembly as well as testing and certification.”

Brain also manufactures a range of other conveyor products including pulley lagging and ceramic wear liners.

Brain Industries devises versatile self-filling tanker for sludge, slurry clean up

An underground coal mine in Australia is piloting the use of a self-filling tank to help clean up sludge and slurries.

The mine in question is Anglo American’s Moranbah North coal operation in Queensland and the product is a new hydraulics-fitted version of Brain Industries’ self-filling tanker, Brain said.

Brain’s Managing Director, Gillian Summers, said the tanker is an advancement on Brain’s air-driven model which enables vacuum recovery, haulage and dumping of heavily solids laden slurries and sludges containing lumps up to 150 mm in size.

Summers said the new 6 cu m tanker has been produced in response to calls from the underground mining industry for more versatility and can be run from any LHD.

She said powerful jet pumps mean Brain’s self-filling tankers vacuum-load continuously to achieve high loading rates. Also, it is constructed aluminium free to comply with mining regulations.

“While the new hydraulics version was produced for underground mines, our self-filling tankers are also suited to applications in hard-rock mining, tunnelling and contract cleaning services,” she said.

“With no moving parts in contact with the material, continuous loading of large lump solids, including waxy, fibrous and abrasive materials, is possible without detriment to the pump.”

Loading stops automatically at a high level when handling wet materials, according to Brain. Excess water can be drained from the tailgate valves to allow top-up of load, maximising hauled solids.

Summers said the tanker is not only easy to use but easy to empty, with the use of a 250-mm diameter dump hatch or full-sized rear door.

Existing customers can also benefit from this new technology, with the company’s line of air driven self-filling tankers able to be retrofitted with hydraulics.

Brain’s self-filling tankers can be skid-mounted or trailer-mounted. The skid-mounted unit is made to be transported on a flatbed trailer or truck using the side-accessed forklift sockets, with the multi-purpose vehicle unit also able to be transported above ground in this way. The trailer-mounted self-filling tanker has a rocker arm, load sharing wheels with oil-filled hubs and solid tyres, Brain added.