Mining is essential to the global economy. After all, there would be no such thing as an iPhone without mining.

Mine operators around the world are under pressure to produce in a difficult environment that goes through cycles of boom and bust depending on commodity prices. Every possible efficiency is explored as they try to stay competitive.

For surface mine operators, one of the most critical pieces of equipment is the haul truck that moves rock and ore to the crushers for processing. It has been said that for every ton of rock, a mine produces one gram of gold or copper. That means a lot of material needs to be moved, efficiently, and reliably to keep a mine operating profitably. Aside from the capital cost of the truck, tires account for a 1/3 of the operating cost of these monster machines. With tires costing up to $80,000 each, accurate monitoring and maintenance of the tires can deliver significant savings and reduce costly downtime.

SST was one of the early pioneers in Tire Pressure Monitoring System (TPMS) for large format mine haul trucks, that operate in some of the harshest environments on the planet. To compound the challenge, some mine operators also add a corrosive fluid inside the tires to protect them, which makes it a very tough environment for sensors. The Duo sensor used for OTR TPMS is recognized for its durability, liquid resistance and accuracy. Recent reports rank the Duo sensor as the most reliable in the market for OTR TPMS application with 98% reliability.

The sensors are deployed in mines operating in Canada, Chile, Mexico, South Africa and Mozambique. On average, mines have reported savings of $5 to $10 million per year through accurate tire pressure and temperature management, preventative maintenance and insights such as driver behaviour on temperature and load balance on tire pressure.

A growing number of Tire Manufacturers, TPMS and Telematics providers have chosen the Duo sensor for their platforms since it was released as an OEM product in late 2017.

SST can provide a solution for OTR TPMS applications from providing only the sensors with integration assistance, gateways, antennas to monitoring software depending on partner requirements.

SST’s OTR TPMS monitoring application, Base Station, provides operators with a graphic display of temperature and pressure condition of tires on a fleet of trucks and provide user defined warnings.