ABB tests ACS 6000 hoist drive

Panorama

Publishing Date: 01 Dec 2011 11:16am GMT
Author: Mining Magazine

Loading & Hauling

ABB has successfully completed testing and no-load commissioning of its new ACS 6000 drive at the Ma JiaLiang coal mine’s main shaft hoist in Shanxi Province, China.

The ACS 6000 is designed to allow for continued hoist operation at half-speed and under fullload, if required by the process. ABB is the first supplier to offer this kind of function in a hoist system. The company said that it will greatly reduce maintenance time and increase the reliability and availability of coal mine production.

The Ma JiaLiang coal mine has a planned annual production capacity of 12Mt of coal and a maximum capacity of 15Mt.
ABB provided two hoist systems for the main shaft. Each hoist pulley has a diameter of 5.7m, a payload of 45t and a motor power of 7,000kW. It uses MV AC-DC-AC direct torque control (DTC) technology and is the biggest hoist system ever installed in China.

ABB began the installation and no-load commissioning in June this year. This covers the mechanical workings for the mine's No. 2 main shaft hoist, the motor, control system and the ACS 6000 MV drive- and brake-control system. The half-speed under full-load function is designed to maintain the safety of the hoist system and continued production in case of failure.
Half-speed with full-load redundancy has been available for systems using DC drives and AC-AC direct conversion frequency drives, but this specific function hasn't been used for hoist systems based on AC-DC-AC frequency conversion drives.

Stephen Zhu, manager of ABB’s Mining and Minerals business in China, said: “ABB designed an ACS 6000 MV drive system using two independent sets of active rectifier units (ARU) and inverter units (INU) for the Ma JiaLiang project. Under normal conditions, the two operate together, providing power to the motor. If one fails, a switch cabinet will connect the redundancy operation mode and start the operational set. This is a significant achievement which can greatly reduce shutdown time, providing our customers continuous production with improved reliability.”