Key Components of Mining Equipment: Performance Enhancement and Maintenance Strategies – Are They Merely Secondary Tasks?

In modern mining industry, the efficient and stable operation of mining equipment is the cornerstone of ensuring production continuity and safety. However, the extreme conditions of mining operations—including high-intensity impacts, severe friction, dust erosion, and corrosive media—make key components of equipment vulnerable to damage. Therefore, in-depth research on performance enhancement and scientific maintenance strategies for these components is not only a necessary condition for ensuring normal equipment operation but also the core of reducing operating costs and improving production efficiency. From the optimized design of wear-resistant parts such as liners and screens to the material selection and maintenance of core working components like track shoes, jaw plates, gears, and cutting picks, every link profoundly affects the overall performance of the equipment.

Material Innovation and Structural Optimization of Wear-Resistant Parts for Mining Equipment

In mining machinery, wear-resistant parts refer to components that directly contact materials or rocks and withstand strong impacts and wear, such as crusher liners, mill balls, excavator bucket teeth, bucket guards, and conveyor roller rubber coatings. The wear of these parts is one of the main sources of equipment maintenance costs. To extend their service life, material innovation is the primary direction. Traditional wear-resistant materials, such as ordinary high manganese steel, can achieve work hardening under strong impacts but perform poorly in low-impact wear environments. Thus, the development and application of new wear-resistant materials have become a trend. These include microalloyed high manganese steel, which further enhances hardness and toughness by adding alloying elements like chromium, molybdenum, and vanadium; and high chromium cast iron, which has high hardness and excellent wear resistance, performing well in sliding wear conditions. Additionally, the application of ceramic composites and cemented carbides in specific parts provides new possibilities for improving wear resistance.

Beyond materials, the structural design of components is also crucial. Through optimized design, the angle of material impact can be adjusted to uniformize wear and avoid stress concentration; or modular, replaceable designs can simplify maintenance processes. For example, grooves or protrusions on crusher liners can alter material movement trajectories, reducing direct impact wear; special-pattern rubber coatings on conveyor rollers can effectively prevent material accumulation and slippage. These subtle structural optimizations, combined with advanced materials, can significantly extend component service life and reduce downtime.

Maintenance and Replacement Cycle Management of Mining Machinery Track Shoes

Track shoes are core components of the walking system in mining machinery (such as excavators and bulldozers), directly bearing the machine’s weight, working loads, and wear from complex ground conditions. Their performance directly affects the equipment’s traction, stability, and passability. Track shoes fail in various ways, most commonly including wear from continuous friction with the ground, fractures under high impact loads, and deformation due to excessive wear. Therefore, scientific maintenance and management of track shoes are crucial.

Firstly, daily inspections are fundamental. Regular checks should be conducted on track shoe surfaces for cracks, deformation, or excessive wear, as well as on loose connecting bolts. In special working conditions, such as environments with corrosive media, surface chemical erosion should also be inspected. Secondly, lubrication management is vital for track links; proper lubrication can reduce wear and extend service life.

More importantly, a reasonable management system for replacement and maintenance cycles should be established. This requires comprehensive consideration of factors such as mine geological conditions, actual equipment working intensity, track shoe wear degree, and production plans. For example, in mines with more hard rocks, wear occurs faster, requiring shorter replacement cycles; in soft soil foundations, cycles can be appropriately extended. By measuring the remaining thickness of track shoes and analyzing historical data, their remaining service life can be predicted, enabling planned replacements before failures occur. This preventive maintenance model is more effective than reactive repairs in reducing operating costs and minimizing production losses from unexpected downtime.

Material Selection of Crusher Jaw Plates and Their Impact on Crushing Efficiency

Crusher jaw plates are the “heart” of jaw crushers, directly contacting ore to be crushed and withstanding enormous impacts and wear. The material selection of jaw plates directly determines crushing efficiency, energy consumption, and service life. Currently, the mainstream material for jaw plates is high manganese steel, which undergoes work hardening under strong impacts, causing surface hardness to increase sharply to resist wear while maintaining high internal toughness to prevent fracture. However, high manganese steel has limitations: in abrasive wear conditions with low impact force, its work hardening effect is insignificant, leading to faster wear.

Thus, when analyzing material selection and performance, consideration must be given to the hardness, toughness of the crushed material, and crushing ratio requirements. For example, when crushing high-hardness, highly abrasive ores, high chromium cast iron jaw plates can be considered—they have extremely high hardness and excellent wear resistance but lack toughness and are prone to fracture under high impact loads. Additionally, a new type of modified high manganese steel, with added trace elements like vanadium and titanium, further enhances wear resistance.

Beyond material, jaw plate structural design is equally critical. Reasonable tooth shape, height, and pitch can optimize material movement in the crushing chamber, improving efficiency and reducing energy consumption. For instance, deep, narrow teeth increase crushing ratio, suitable for harder materials; shallow, wide teeth are suitable for tougher materials, effectively preventing blockages. Therefore, selecting jaw plates requires balancing material, structure, and crushing conditions to achieve the optimal balance of efficiency, energy consumption, and service life.

Common Fault Diagnosis and Prevention of Mining Gear Transmission Components

Gear transmission systems are common in mining equipment, widely used in reducers, gearboxes, and various drive devices. In harsh mining environments, gear transmission components endure high loads, impacts, and dust erosion. Common faults such as pitting, scuffing, wear, and tooth breakage directly threaten normal equipment operation.

• Pitting results from contact fatigue on tooth surfaces under cyclic loads, forming small spalls.
• Scuffing occurs under high-speed, heavy loads when the tooth surface oil film breaks, causing direct metal contact, local welding, and tearing.
• Wear happens when lubrication is poor or abrasives are present, abrading tooth surfaces.
• Tooth breakage is typically caused by overload, impact, or material defects.

For fault diagnosis, vibration analysis is highly effective. By installing vibration sensors on gearboxes, real-time monitoring of vibration signals is possible. Normally operating gear systems have specific vibration spectra; tooth surface damage or bearing wear alters these spectra, enabling early fault warnings through analysis. Oil analysis is another important diagnostic tool: regular sampling and analysis of lubricating oil can detect metal particles, moisture, and oxidation products, indicating gear and bearing wear and lubrication status.

For prevention, scientific lubrication management is primary: selecting suitable lubricating oil for working conditions, ensuring system cleanliness, and regular oil changes reduce wear and scuffing. Secondly, ensuring gear assembly precision avoids local stress concentration from improper installation. Finally, load analysis and fatigue calculations during design ensure gears have sufficient strength and service life to adapt to mining conditions.

Failure Analysis and Performance Improvement of Roadheader Picks

Roadheader picks, as key tools for roadheading machinery in coal mines, tunnels, and other projects, directly determine heading efficiency and costs. In hard, complex rock formations, picks endure enormous impacts, wear, and compressive stress, with diverse failure modes. The most common failure is wear, caused by long-term friction between the pick’s alloy tip and rock. Next is chipping—local fragmentation of the alloy tip when encountering hard interlayers or excessive impact. Tooth breakage, the most severe failure, is usually caused by fatigue or overload impact.

Firstly, optimizing pick geometry: reasonable tip angle and rake angle design can alter contact with rock, reducing wear and chipping risks. For example, increasing the tip angle enhances impact resistance but sacrifices some cutting efficiency; decreasing it improves efficiency but reduces wear resistance and chipping resistance, requiring a balance.

Secondly, material is core to pick performance. Mainstream alloy tips use tungsten carbide-based cemented carbides; adjusting tungsten carbide particle size and cobalt content changes alloy hardness and toughness. More cobalt improves toughness but reduces hardness; less cobalt increases hardness but decreases toughness, so alloy ratios must suit specific geological conditions.

Additionally, heat treatment significantly affects pick performance: scientific processes optimize the pick body’s microstructure, enhancing strength and toughness to resist fracture and fatigue failure.

In summary, comprehensive failure analysis of roadheader picks and integrated improvements in geometry, alloy materials, and heat treatment are effective ways to enhance heading efficiency, reduce tool costs, and extend equipment service life.