Material Movement Concepts
Material movement refers to any transaction where material has been moved in the mining process. This generally falls into four main areas:
Mining – The movement of material pre-crushing. This material is typically moved using trucks and is often referred to as Dispatch or Haulage.
Hoisting – Material movements at underground operations may also include material movements that have been sent up mine shafts. This is referred to as Hoisted material. This can be represented by a control point in Reconcilor.
Processing – The movement of material from post-crushing through to product. These transactions are often referred to as “Plant” transactions and are synonymous with Belt Tonnes. This is often represented by a control point in Reconcilor.
Transportation and Shipping – The movement of material post-product through to receipt from the mining operation’s customers. This is often presented as moved material (similar to mining) from a specified source to a destination in Reconcilor.
Each type of material movement can be grouped as follows:
- Haulage Transactions (that is, Mining/Dispatch Movements, Transport and Shipping).
- Control Point Transactions (that is, Hoist, Processing, weightometers, sampling).
Haulage Transactions
Haulage (or Dispatch) is the record of material movement by truck or loader between two points within a mine. This movement is usually either done by weightometers in the truck beds or by units of truckload/bucketload.
The source and destination of the movement is usually done by either manual entry from the equipment operator, or by GPS in a fleet management system.
Control Point Transactions
Control point transactions are material movements that are recorded against an arbitrary point in a detailed mine value chain. Control points are typically weightometers and samplers. These control points add additional data regarding mass and grade that can be helpful for reconciliation.
Control Point Groups
A Control Point Group is a grouping of one or more control points. Control Point groups can be used identify where a Control point is in the process circuit. Reconcilor contains a list of default control point groups.
Reconcilor provides the following standard control point groups:
- Plant Feed
- Plant Product
- Plant Reject
- Hoisted Material
- Plant Bypass
- Plant Output
- Transport Loading
- Product Shipped
- Product Received
These standard Control Point Groups are used by the standard Comparison Value Type Rules for Plant comparisons values. These rules are not allowed to be changed, unlike the rules for mining and modelling comparisons values.
Custom Control Point Groups may also be created for reporting purposes.
