5DT steps-up simulator training for Australian miners
South African virtual reality software and training provider 5DT signalled a concerted push into the Australian market at Aimex 2011, with the company showing off a pioneering visualisation tool for underground coal miners.
Close up screen shot of the Visualiser demonstrating a continuous miner's cut sequence.
5DT’s move on the Aussie market began several months ago, when it opened a new office in Brisbane targeting the resources industry. The company already had an existing distributor in Perth.
At Aimex, 5DT revealed a shift sideways from its line-up of mining equipment simulators into visualisation software. Its brand new Coal Mining Visualiser is designed to consider a miner’s operational parameters and optimise production schedules and coal seam utilisation.
The Visualiser’s most impressive feature is the animated schedule it generates and displays on a monitor, allowing the viewer to see how all the various machines interact.
It displays the operational schedule at an increased rate, allowing a mine planner to quickly comprehend where, for example, the roof bolter will be in relation to the continuous miners while displaying where the shuttle bars and feeder breakers are located.
5DT’s marketing director, Steven Marshall, says the Visualiser is a step forward from the current capabilities of the myriad mining consultants that offer mine planning software.
“We put in all of the parameters that would normally be simulated. [The Visualiser] replaces twenty spreadsheets with one simple solution.”
Marshall said the software can overlay onto the production schedule ventilation schematics, determine the effects of check curtains, which halt airflow, and determine the optimal configuration – a major boon for mine planners.
It took 5DT almost three years to develop the Visualiser for coal and the firm has already begun to adapt the technology for more complex, non-grid based hard rock mines.
Contact: www.5DT.com
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