Recently, Zoomlion mining dump trucks equipped with Yuchai YCK16 engines have successfully completed batch delivery in Peru and will be put into operation in the gold mine project in the Andes Mountains of northern Peru.
As core power supporting parties, domestic power leaders, equipment manufacturing companies and local end customers have jointly witnessed the further implementation of China’s high-end mining equipment in the Peruvian market.
The project is located in the Andes Mountains of northern Peru. The mining area has typical working conditions such as high altitude, steep slopes, large dust, and heavy-load continuous operation, which places high requirements on the power, reliability and durability of the mining truck.
As an important power product designed for heavy-duty mining conditions, the Yuchai YCK16 engine has a maximum power of 775 horsepower. It has the characteristics of large torque, strong gradeability, fast response, and high reliability. It can provide solid power guarantee for the efficient operation of Zoomlion mining trucks under complex mining conditions.
This time the two parties join hands to go overseas, which further reflects the product strength of domestic engines in the field of mining equipment, and also enhances the brand influence of Chinese power brands in the South American market.
The six core advantages of China’s mining equipment: from following to global parallel and leading locally
China’s mining equipment has moved away from simple “cost-effective substitution” and has formed crushing competitiveness in the six dimensions of the entire industry chain, electrified intelligent technology, oversized heavy equipment, complete set integration, delivery services, and global adaptation, and has achieved exclusive global leadership in some tracks.
1. The world’s most complete industrial chain, independent and controllable without “stuck”
This is the underlying advantage that European, American and Japanese brands cannot copy: First, full category coverage, covering exploration drilling, underground mining, open-pit mining, crushing and screening, washing, transportation, and mining operations.
The entire chain of transportation, shaft excavation, and green intelligent supporting equipment, from small sand and gravel mobile stations to 300-ton mining trucks and thousand-meter shaft boring machines, are all self-developed and mass-produced. Carter, Komatsu, and Sandvik are only good at a single segment and cannot provide a full set of equipment. Second, there is a breakthrough in the localization of core components, and the field of fuel-fired models is large.
Type hydraulics, heavy-duty gearboxes, wear-resistant liners, and heavy-duty frames have been domestically produced in batches; electric models have achieved corner overtaking; permanent magnet drive motors, mining power batteries, BMS battery management systems, and high-voltage electronic control patents account for more than 60% of the world’s patents, avoiding overseas fuel engine patent barriers; leading the way in digital components
Domain 5G mining base stations, vehicle-mounted sensing radars, edge computing, and driverless controllers are all supplied locally; third, the upstream and downstream supporting clusters are mature. Xuzhou, Changsha, Liuzhou, and Luoyang have formed a heavy industry cluster. The parts delivery cycle is 40% shorter than that in Europe and the United States, and the cost of parts is 30%-40% lower.
2. Electrified, zero-carbon mines lead the world, with exclusive large-scale implementation
As the core track of the green transformation of the global mining industry, China is significantly ahead of overseas giants in this field: electric mining trucks achieve full tonnage coverage
, mass production of pure electric mining trucks from 60 tons to 240 tons. XCMG’s 240-ton electric mining trucks won the largest green mining machine export order in the history of Australian FMG; Sany’s electric mining trucks consume only 1/3 of the energy of fuel trucks, and a single mine saves nearly one million in annual operating costs.
At the same time, electric equipment can be covered in all scenes of extreme cold and extreme heat. The unmanned electric fleet of Inner Mongolia’s open-pit mine operates stably at minus 40 degrees Celsius. The purely unmanned mining truck without the cab is the first in the world to be commercialized. Liugong’s 100-ton electric excavator, electric loader, and electric grader form a complete electric mining matrix.
Chinese companies can also provide integrated photovoltaic, storage, charging and swapping solutions. Overseas brands only sell bicycles. Chinese companies can provide photovoltaic energy storage, fast power swap stations, and vehicle dispatching systems to build zero-carbon mines in one stop. They have been implemented on a large scale in copper mines in Africa and South America.
Market data shows that domestic electric mining trucks account for nearly 40% of the domestic market, and the commercialization scale of similar overseas products is less than 1/5 of China’s.
3. Ultra-large heavy-duty and deep mining equipment breaks the century-old monopoly of foreign countries
Domestic production has fully broken through the high-end large-tonnage track that was once exclusively dominated by foreign capital, and many equipment are the first in the world: in the field of open-air ultra-large equipment,
The 300-ton fully autonomous electric-driven mining truck has completely broken away from the monopoly of imported chassis; the 400-ton mining excavator is equipped with a 22 cubic meter super-large bucket, and 6 buckets are filled with a 200-ton mining truck. The operating efficiency is comparable to Carter’s top model, and the price is only 60% of it.
The field of deep underground mining is unique in the world. The world’s first 1,000-meter hard rock shaft boring machine “Steel Spine” overcomes the world’s difficult problem of ultra-deep hard rock shaft construction. There is no similar mass production equipment abroad. It is used for deep mining of iron ore and metal mines, significantly reducing underground high altitude.
Risky manual operations; the 10-meter ultra-large mining height intelligent shearer is the world’s most powerful and ultra-thick coal seam mining equipment, monopolizing the domestic 10-million-ton coal mine market; mining hard rock TBMs and tunnel boring machines account for 70% of the global market, and are exported to hard rock mines in Australia and Russia.
In the field of exploration and deep drilling equipment, 10,000-meter deep-sea drilling ships, 2,200-meter deep-hole core drilling rigs, and high-precision geophysical gravimeters support domestic exploration of new energy minerals such as lithium, nickel, and cobalt. Domestic exploration equipment is used in Antarctic scientific expeditions.
4. Intelligent unmanned mining overall solution, with obvious advantages of integrating software and hardware
Foreign equipment only makes hardware, while China realizes equipment + communication + platform + dispatching complete digital mine closed loop: 5G/5G-A open-pit unmanned mining has matured for commercial use
, a fully unmanned open-pit mine built by domestic communications giants and heavy industry companies, realizing autonomous formation of mining trucks, automatic loading and unloading, active obstacle avoidance, and remote cluster dispatching. Dozens of large domestic coal mines and iron mines operate unmanned 24 hours a day all year round. The accident rate has been reduced by 30%, and labor costs have been reduced by 40%.
It has leading full-process AI operation and maintenance capabilities. The equipment is equipped with fault prediction, intelligent optimization of fuel consumption and energy consumption, automatic production statistics system, and unified cloud management of hundreds of equipment. Most of the European and American brand intelligent software is outsourced, with poor compatibility and expensive charges.
At the same time, it supports remote control + fewer people underground. Kilometer-deep tunnel boring machines and shearers can achieve remote control on the ground, greatly avoiding gas and landslide safety risks, and adapting to strict mine safety regulations in various countries around the world.
5. Complete delivery, ultimate cost-effectiveness and fast service, matching the urgent needs of overseas customers
First, it has one-stop complete general contracting capabilities. Overseas mining projects generally require a complete set of production lines of “mining + crushing + washing + transportation + intelligent operation and maintenance”. Carter and Sandvik can only supply a single unit. Chinese companies can provide overall design, unified manufacturing, unified debugging and delivery; 70% of Chinese-funded overseas mining companies are equipped with domestic equipment, and comprehensive procurement costs are reduced by more than 20%.
Second, the delivery cycle crushes foreign investment. Orders from major European and American manufacturers are scheduled for 1-2 years. Domestic leading manufacturers have sufficient production capacity and the delivery cycle of large equipment is shortened by 30-60 days. The construction schedules of mining projects in Africa and South America are tight, and Chinese equipment is preferred.
The third is global localization and rapid after-sales improvement. Domestic heavy industry leaders have established spare parts centers and service stations in 30+ countries along the “Belt and Road”, promising that engineers will be on-site for maintenance within 72 hours. It often takes half a month for foreign brands to dispatch overseas parts, resulting in huge losses due to work stoppages.
For equipment of the same tonnage, the domestic purchase price is 30%-40% lower, and the cost of accessories and maintenance is halved.
6. Ultimate environmental adaptation, covering extreme mining conditions around the world
Domestic equipment is specially customized for complex overseas mines and adapts to the climate and geology of most mining areas around the world: in extremely cold environments, it can operate in the open air at -40°C in Mongolia and Russia.
Stable mine operation; dust protection and heat dissipation enhancement for tropical copper mines in Congo and Zambia in Africa under high temperature and high dust environments; dynamic plateau compensation for lithium mines in the South American Andes above 3,000 meters in plateau scenarios; and supports soft rock/hard rock/sand and gravel landforms.
Most foreign-invested models are designed for mild mines in Europe and the United States, and the failure rate is significantly higher in harsh working conditions in Africa and Central Asia.
