plant

The use of a ball mill in the grinding process is a traditional technique widely used for particle size reduction or for mixing materials, used in various industrial works, such as mining companies. In this sense, because it is a more severe environment, it is necessary to use a motor with greater resistance and protection.

With efficient solutions in the mining sector, WEG supplied a slip ring motor from the M Mining line, frame 560, 1,300 kW, 3,300 V, 4 poles, 50 Hz to drive the ball mill of a mining company in Argentina. The applied motor makes the process more efficient, ensuring greater operational security, in addition to having simple and reduced maintenance.

WEG motors of the M Mining line were specially developed with electromechanical characteristics that provide durability, resistance and robustness, ideal for operating in harsh environments in the mining and cement segment. The big difference in this project is that to reduce the need for field adjustments, WEG adapted the manufacturing process to scale the solution according to the customer’s needs.

This supply consolidates WEG as one of the main suppliers of motors for the mining segment in Latin America, in addition to reinforcing the company’s flexibility in meeting the specific needs of its customers. For the customer, it increases reliability in operation and reduces downtime for maintenance.

Advantages of the motorized brush lifting system

The new brush lifting system is the evolution of the already established WEG brush lifting system, with the incorporation of the operating logic, fault investigation capabilities, operation monitoring via HMI simplifying and reducing the costs of motor installation, operation, and maintenance. In order to carry out the operation logic in a simpler way, its operation is via PLC. The monitoring of the operation and eventual faults is available via the integrated PLC’s display so that the user has full control over the performance of this system.

The need for maintenance compared to a fixed brush system reduces considerably, due to the brushes being lifted after the motor starts, in addition to allowing the elimination or reduction of several variables, such as:

• Suitability of the brush to the environment (humidity, patina formation)
• Brushes wear (very low or high temperature, ring roughness and spring pressure)
• Brushes compartment cleaning
• Cooling

The lifting set has a gearbox driving the operation, adding robustness, reliability, and simplicity to the system. The brush holder works with constant pressure springs and has three inspection points, allowing agility and visibility in preventive, predictive or corrective maintenance. The internal position of the lifting mechanism is read by means of inductive sensors and they have a system that indicates their operating status.