A key focus among the services CDC provides its customers is its
maintenance and repair contract service in which the customer signs over to CDC’s
service division full responsibility for maintenance and repair of the dust suppression
equipment on the CM’s. This service encompasses not only providing maintenance backup
on equipment supplied by CDC, but on all the dust suppression equipment in use by the
mine, regardless of make or supplier. By providing such a service CDC
extends the commitment it has already established in respect of its own products to ensure
high performance and good reliability of all the dust suppression equipment in use by the
customer.
CDC maintenance and repair contracts mean
decreased costs and increased coal production
Collieries making use of this option have seen remarkable and rapid improvements
in dust counts, reduced overall costs and increased coal production levels as a direct
result of the rigorous maintenance procedures that CDC’s maintenance staff apply.
Users have seen dust counts plummet from 20 mg/cu m and more before the
maintenance and repair contract was put into effect to below the Department of Minerals
and Energy’s prescribed minimum of 5 mg/cu m shortly after it was put in place. In
addition, collieries’ costs have dropped as a result of reduced expenditure on
repairs and spares and less downtime, with more coal being produced at less cost.
CDC’s maintenance technicians work alongside the mine’s own machine
maintenance personnel, resulting in better communication and co-operation between supplier
and customer and an overall improvement in maintenance and operational efficiency.
Another important positive spin-off of the maintenance and repair contracts has
been a marked decline in demand for repairs on dust suppression equipment, which CDC
attributes directly to the improved performance and life of equipment resulting largely
from the maintenance and repair contracts it has in place. The company’s pump shop,
for instance, experienced a dramatic 25 per cent decline in pump repairs in the year 2000.
