Luanping Baolan Zhong Mining Co., Ltd. is a Chinese company located in Luanping County, Chengde, Hebei Province, China. The company is specialized in iron ore crushing and beneficiation. The current crushing production line uses the old technology of the spring cone crusher. Due to the expansion of the mining business, the outdated equipment has led to some problems like higher maintenance costs, lower productivity and less automation, which squeezes the production margin of the company. That is why the company decided to make a special technical upgrade in the secondary and tertiary crushing lines.
The objectives of this upgrade were clearly formulated and included three basic requirements:
First, decrease the particle size of the material being sent for grinding in order to decrease the energy consumption of the ball mills and decrease the consumption of grinding media – steel balls and liners.Second, decrease the number of secondary and tertiary cone crushers in order to minimize the expenses related to the procurement of spare parts, maintenance and equipment supervision.Third, replace the obsolete spring cone crushers which were difficult to operate and often failed, with the automated crushing equipment in order to simplify the process and decrease the loss due to unexpected downtime.
In 2024, the company agreed on the upgrade of the production line with MP Mining Equipment, and the core secondary crushing equipment, CC890, was installed, launched and put into service in September of the same year. After the upgrade, the production line preserved its productivity of 20,000 tons per day, but the key parameters of operation have been improved in the whole system, providing the company with a cost-efficient upgrade model for iron ore crushing operations.
Pre-upgrade Production Line Configuration and Basic Challenges
Prior to the technical upgrade, the coarse crushing line of the entire crushing line kept one K9135 gyratory crusher without any changes. The secondary crushing line was equipped with two 2200-type spring cone crushers, while the tertiary crushing line included three units of the same model. In total, the production line used five cone crushers as the primary crushing equipment.Due to the low productivity of the old spring cone crushers, the production line had to operate 20 hours per day in order to produce 20,000 tons per day. The hourly capacity was 1,000 tons, and the crushed product size was 15 mm. This particle size worked as the final crushed product and as the feed material for the ball mill.After years of stable operation, the traditional process of spring cone crushing started showing four basic challenges which were the reason of the need for upgrade.
The 15 mm feed particle size going to the grinding process was relatively large. As a result, the energy consumption, steel ball consumption and liner wear remained at the high level during years, providing additional pressure on the general operation costs of the beneficiation process.
High Labor and Spare Parts Expenses Caused by Using Multiple Machines
Five spring cone crushers were used together, leading to the large consumption of wear parts such as liners, springs and sealers. The number of machines required the use of multiple operators for supervision and maintenance. At the same time, larger spare parts stock was required, which increases the expenses on the maintenance.
Low Automation Level and Frequent Machine Downtime
The traditional spring cone crushers required manual regulation of the discharge opening right on the site. The procedure of the replacement of the wear parts was complex, and the protection from uncrushable materials such as iron pieces was limited. In case of appearance of such materials in the crushing chamber, the machine was likely to get blocked and stopped, causing interruption of the continuous production.
Low Single-Machine Productivity and Rapid Equipment Wear
The original equipment had relatively low single-machine productivity and could work under full load only during the extended period. This caused acceleration of the equipment aging and increase of the power consumption.
Customized Technical Upgrade Solution by MP Mining Equipement
On the basis of the features of highly abrasive iron ore, the constant daily requirement of 20,000 tons, existing shop layout and the objectives of the company to decrease the costs and improve the efficiency, the upgrade solution was developed by MP. It includes the replacement of the spring cone crushers with the single-cylinder hydraulic cone crushers, reduction of the number of the machines and the optimization of the product particle size.This solution helps to keep the existing front-end crushing equipment. The K9135 gyratory crusher in the primary crushing line remains completely unchanged, while the secondary and tertiary crushing equipment will be replaced. The complete process configuration before and after the upgrade is presented in the table below.
Primary crushing K9135 gyratory crusher ×1 unit K9135 gyratory crusher ×1 unit The existing primary crusher shows stable working performance and doesn't require replacement, that saves additional investment
Secondary crushing 2200-type spring cone crusher ×2 units MP CC890 single-cylinder cone crusher ×1 unit Two old spring cone crushers are replaced by one high-capacity single-cylinder hydraulic cone crusher, decreasing the number of machines
Tertiary crushing 2200-type spring cone crusher ×3 units MP CC500 single-cylinder cone crusher ×3 units (2 operating + 1 backup) All old spring cone crushers are replaced with precise single-cylinder machines, having one backup machine for the continuity of production
Total number of cone crushers 5 units 3 units The number of crushing machines is decreased by 40%
Selection of Equipment and Design Rationality
As clearly shown in the comparative table, all changes were made in order to improve the equipment arrangement. Every change was made specially to solve original issues, therefore creating the whole technical improvement scheme.Firstly, the CC890 single-cylinder hydraulic cone crusher was selected for the replacement of two existing spring cone crushers in the secondary crushing process. The capacity range of the new equipment makes from 366 to 1,783 TPH, thus providing replacement of the two old machines at once ("One machine instead of two machines"). Such solution allows reducing the number of units, spare parts consumption and equipment management.Secondly, the CC500 was selected for the tertiary crushing process. The closed-side setting range of the new equipment starts from 10 mm, thus allowing producing fine crushed ore with 12 mm in size, solving the problem of oversized mill feed particles and ball mill operating costs. Three CC500 equipment is arranged according to 2+1 scheme. Thus, the production won't stop because of one faulty unit.Thirdly, the fully automatic PLC controlled hydraulic system replaces the traditional spring system, solving the issue of the complicated manual operation and insufficient overload protection. All major components – bearings, hydraulic system, electrical control system and sensors are produced by international brands, thus providing reliable work of the equipment under the intensive working process of iron ore crushing, providing increase of replacement cycle period and decrease of the operating costs.
Main Parameters and Technical Features of the CC890 and CC500 Core Equipment
Selected CC890 secondary crushing single-cylinder cone crusher and CC500 tertiary crushing single-cylinder cone crusher are core models that are designed especially for iron ore crushing applications. The selected equipment fits perfectly the production requirements of the project. Their main parameters and technical features are presented below.
CC890 Single-Cylinder Hydraulic Cone Crusher (Secondary Crushing Equipment)
The CC890 has the total installed power 793 kW, including 750 kW main crushing motor and 43 kW hydraulic power unit.The equipment has six different crushing chamber models: EC, C, MC, M, MF and F. The maximum range of the feed particle size is 428 mm – 139 mm, thus allowing handling the large iron ore feed materials during the secondary crushing.The range of closed-side setting is 16–70 mm. Due to MP's CLP (Constant Liner Performance) crushing chamber technology, the machine guarantees the stability of the product size distribution during the operation.The range of processing capacity is 366 to 1,783 TPH. Thus, a single CC890 allows replacement of the two previous spring cone crushers regarding the production capacity.The machine weight without motor and hydraulic power unit is 97,031 kg. Overall dimensions with the feed hopper are 6,670 × 3,600 × 5,209 mm.The equipment has fully automatic tramp iron protection system that allows automatically releasing the uncrushable material and restoring the machine work after passing of it, as well as providing manual intervention if necessary.The discharge opening adjustment allows using three operation modes: preset parameter adjustment, local/remote touchscreen control and handheld controller operation.The control system uses the Siemens PLC system with two touchscreens and all sensors. It also has RS485/RS232 communication interfaces and USB data export ports, thus allowing exporting the operation and maintenance data just in one click.The main components of the equipment are the upper shell, lower shell, main shaft, hydraulic cylinder, gear transmission system and dust protection cover.CC890 Single-Cylinder Hydraulic Cone Crusher
CC500 Single-Cylinder Hydraulic Cone Crusher (Tertiary Crushing Equipment)
The CC500 has the total installed power 667 kW, including 630 kW main crushing motor and 37 kW hydraulic power unit.The equipment has seven different crushing chamber models: EC, C, MC, M, MF, F and EF. The equipment fits fine crushing requirements.The maximum range of the feed particle size is 300 mm – 80 mm, thus allowing precision tertiary crushing.The range of the closed-side setting is 10–70 mm. Thus, the machine allows producing stable 12 mm finished product.The range of processing capacity is 280 to 1,331 TPH.The machine weight without motor and hydraulic power unit is 50,000 kg. Overall dimensions with the feed hopper are 3,049 × 2,450 × 4,844 mm.All technical features of the CC500 are identical to the CC890 ones – tramp iron protection, multiple discharge opening adjustment modes, PLC automatic control system, CLP constant crushing chamber technology and optimized core components construction.Uniform design of the two models allows increasing the spare parts interchangeability, thus providing better spare parts inventory management and decreasing their storage costs.
The equipment of both models is based on the premium imported components and international brands.Bearings are based on SKF imported bearings; lubrication pumps are provided by Kracht Germany; hydraulic pumps are produced by Marzocchi Italy; pressure sensors – by WIKA and Danfoss; PLC controllers use Siemens systems; WEINVIEW touchscreens have Chinese and English interface; soft starters are provided by RENLE (Xi'an Xichi); low-voltage electrical components are provided by Schneider Electric.Entire machine uses the three-layer antirust coating system of Nippon Industrial Paint. Epoxy zinc phosphate primer, epoxy micaceous iron oxide intermediate coating and polyurethane topcoat allow providing reliable operation of the equipment under harsh mining environment with high dust and humidity and intensive abrasion.
In this upgrade project, maintaining the original daily production capacity of 20,000 tons as the primary objective was maintained. Thanks to the equipment optimization, the project enhanced the main indicators like the finished product/mill feed particle size, daily operating hours, and unit-hour processing efficiency. Here is the comparison of key production indicators before and after the upgrade:
Indicator Before Upgrade After Upgrade Optimization Value
Finished product / mill feed particle size 15 mm 12 mm Particle size reduced by 3 mm, lowering ore grinding difficulty and ball mill energy consumption as well as steel ball / liner wear.Daily production capacity 20,000 tons/day 20,000 tons/day Main production capacity kept the same, ensuring that the production scale will not be influenced by the upgrade.Daily operating hours 20 hours 18 hours Daily operating time reduced by 2 hours, decreasing continuous equipment wear and electricity consumption Hourly processing capacity Approximately 1,000 tons/hour Approximately 1,100 tons/hour Unit-hour processing efficiency increased by approximately 10%
Based on the above-mentioned improvements in the data, this upgrade project has brought four main benefits, fulfilling the original requirements of the company.
The mill feed particle size was decreased from 15 mm to 12 mm, which made it easier to carry out the internal crushing of the ore, resulting in significantly reduced grinding workload.This lowered the electricity consumption of the ball mill and the wear of the grinding media like steel balls and liners, thus ensuring long-term cost savings in the beneficiation process.
Reducing the number of cone crushers from five units to three units, thus greatly reducing the total wear part consumption.The required labor hours for equipment monitoring and maintenance are greatly reduced, while reducing the requirements for spare parts inventory, maintenance downtime loss and repair cost.
MP CC series single cylinder cone crusher eliminated the traditional manual adjustment mode adopted by spring cone crusher.The equipment operating parameters could be adjusted remotely by the operator through local or remote touchscreen.Wear part replacement procedure is greatly simplified.Moreover, this equipment is equipped with the function of automatic tramp iron protection and automatic resetting function. When there are some foreign objects inside the crushing chamber, the system could automatically discharge the uncrushable material.
In the condition of keeping the same daily production capacity, the hourly processing capacity increased by about 10% and daily operating time was shortened by 2 hours.Not only did it reduce the equipment wear caused by long-term overload operation but also effectively saved the electricity consumption and operational expense.
The core equipment CC890 was commissioned and put into operation in September 2024. Since then, the upgraded crushing production line has been operating stably.According to the feedback of the owner of the site, the equipment is currently running well, and all the targeted goals of upgrading have been successfully fulfilled.From the perspective of the production capacity and particle size control, the production line has been maintaining the same daily production capacity of 20,000 tons, with the crushed product and mill feed particle size always controlled at 12 mm, representing a reduction of 3 mm compared with the original process.From the perspective of production efficiency, the hourly processing capacity has been stabilized at about 1,100 tons/hour. The daily production goal could now be fulfilled within just 18 hours of operation time, which represents a reduction of 2 hours of daily operating time compared with the previous system.From the perspective of operation and maintenance management, the amount of cone crushers in operation has been greatly reduced. The wear part replacement frequency and maintenance workloads have been greatly reduced, while the unexpected failures like tramp iron blockage and cone crusher shutdown have been greatly reduced.Regarding the operational experience, the operators could remotely adjust the equipment operating parameters through the central control touchscreen without the need of any manual operation, thus greatly reducing the labor intensity of front-line workers.
After the operation of nearly two years, the comprehensive cost saving benefits of the project have been continuously appearing.The optimized mill feed particle size continuously reduced ball mill power consumption and grinding media costs. The reduction in the number of cone crushers has greatly reduced the requirements for spare parts inventory and maintenance labor costs. The comprehensive automation upgrade has reduced the production losses caused by unexpected downtime.All these resulted in an overall reduction of the operating cost of the whole crushing production line.
Summary
This upgrade project was developed according to the actual problems existed in the production of the mine. With the application of MP single cylinder hydraulic cone crusher, the project successfully updated the outdated spring cone crusher system while maintaining the original daily production capacity.The upgrade project achieved five major goals:Particle size optimization, crushing efficiency improvement, equipment quantity reduction, maintenance cost reduction and production automation enhancement.With the experience of more than 15 years in mining crushing industry, MP has successfully carried out more than one hundred technical upgrade projects for iron ore mines and aggregate production lines.This case provided a complete record of the upgrade process, measured data and production benefit, thus providing a practical reference solution to the iron ore crushing production line technical upgrade.
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