During the commissioning stage of the primary crushing system at the Salvador work center, there has been evidence of cargo “hanging” at the level of the entry of the bin that discharges vertically to the upper feeders of the primary crushers in the concentrator plant. It has not been found a way to remove this load that is also safe without exposing people.

Recurrently in the use of primary crusher.

Loss of productivity and utilization in primary crusher.

Manually with tools used in under ground mining.

There have been tests performed with drills

• Consulting, advisories and engineering studies.
• Solutions that do not allow preventing or removing minerals in the hopper of top feeders in primary crusher.

Remove minerals at the entry bin level that discharges vertically to the upper feeders of the primary crushers of the concentrator plant of Codelco’s Salvador Division. This condition causes a significant loss in both performance and utilization of the primary crushing process. Alternatives are required to allow the load to be removed safely and without exposing personnel.

1. The solution must remove minerals from the hopper of the upper feeders in the primary crusher, avoiding exposure of the personnel involved. 2. The parameters to be considered in the solution selection are: – Impact on infrastructure. – Operational interference. – Time required to solve the obstruction. – Maintainability of the solution.