Mobile Equipment | Non-Processing Infrastructure
The Ramu Nickle-Cobalt Mine in Madang Province, Papua New Guinea, is one of the country’s most significant mining operations. The crane fleet supporting operations is spread over the port, Basamuk refinery and Kurumbukari mine site, and includes wharf, mobile and overhead cranes. The site is remote and required a complete audit for regulatory compliance across the fleet, requiring broad and deep inspection expertise. The site engaged FIELD Engineers for experience in delivering strategic, efficient inspections across multiple crane types.
FIELD Engineers had a choice of experienced and CraneSafe-endorsed inspectors from our team, including a Mandarin speaker. This made the work easy to resource on the client’s desired timetable with swift mobilisation to the remote site. The pre-planned inspection schedule was flexible enough for the inspectors to adapt on the ground and complete reporting in parallel to inspections, minimising time to issue deliverables to the client. In this largely Mandarin-speaking site, FIELD’s Mandarin-speaker inspector was able to deal with the client in their own language, a cross-disciplinary skill that further smoothed the inspection process.
The inspection and reporting team completed the work well ahead of schedule and all inspection reports were completed within days of the on-site work. The client was provided with prioritised action items for each unit to bring the fleet into regulatory compliance, and a schedule for future inspections. This project provided rapid assurance to the client while minimising disruptions to on-site operations and will allow capital and maintenance spend to be strategically allocated and forecasted into the future.
This full-fleet inspection and engineering advice on maintenance priorities rests on the long experience of FIELD Engineers in crane maintenance and advice – including for aging cranes where strategic expertise is needed to maximise safe working life. Other notable similar projects that informed the success of the Ramu Nico audit are:
From an initial audit in 2014, FIELD Engineers has maintained a rolling inspection schedule for over 200 cranes in the Lihir fleet. Our inspections have focused on meeting regulatory requirements and providing prioritised maintenance lists and inspection strategies to inform the site’s capital spend. Our familiarity with the fleet has embedded efficiencies over time and carefully considers the shutdowns necessary for examination and load testing, especially for cranes operating in a corrosive environment that require careful attention to structural integrity.
The Weipa crane fleet included mobile cranes and man-baskets. FIELD carried out both annual inspections of these cranes and provided engineering calculations of remaining design life. This provided an optimised inspection strategy based on condition and use, rather than nominal time periods. This ensured safe operation without unnecessary costs or downtime.
The BlueScope Brisbane crane fleet is another example of long-term collaboration where FIELD Engineers inspection services provide maintenance strategies and monitors the design life of multiple cranes. First audited in 2019, FIELD has since filled the role of third-party inspector for the fleet, providing professional engineering oversight for major inspections and recommending inspection schedules appropriate to the age and utilisation of the cranes.
Where cranes are reaching structural design life on theoretical calculations, our engineers perform a broader assessment – examining previous standards (where cranes were made to legacy design criteria), testing the physical condition of the crane, and recommending inspection schedules to allow safe continuing operation wherever possible. This ensures that operations spend maintenance budget on essential items and have forecasts of requirements for future planning.
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