New System Manages Main Compressor on Rotary Drills--Several advancements allow dramatic savings in fuel and extend the service intervals for the engine and compressor

摘要

It sounds odd, but an idling blasthole drill is really nothing more than a high horsepower lube pump. The drill's main compressor is directly coupled to the engine. When the engine is running, the compressor is turning, burning fuel and generating heat. If the compressor is turning, it needs to be lubricated. Otherwise, the bearings would seize. The idea always seemed a bit risky, but engineers love a challenge and several have considered changing the drill's compressor arrangement. For others, fiddling with the compressor was simply taboo. Early attempts to disengage the compressor from the drill relied on a clutching arrangement and met with varying degrees of success. The torque required to turn the compressor was so great the clutches were expensive to maintain and often rendered unreliable. Meanwhile, the OEMs building drills had to balance the compressors, which came from one source with a set of guidelines, with diesel engines from another source with differing set of recommendations.