History
Bucket-wheel excavators have been used in mining for the past century, with some of the first being manufactured in the 1920s. They are used in conjunction with many other pieces of mining machinery (conveyer belts, spreaders, crushing stations, heap-leach systems, etc.) to move and mine massive amounts of overburden (waste). While the overall concepts that go into a BWE have not changed much, their size has grown drastically since the end of World War Two.
In the 1950s two German mining firms ordered the world's first extremely large BWEs, and had three BWEs built for mining lignite near Cologne, Germany. The German BWEs had a wheel of over 52 feet in diameter, weighed 5500 tons and was over 600 feet long, with eighteen crawler units for movement and could cut a swath of over 600 feet at one time
BWEs built since the 1990s, such as the Bagger 293, have reached sizes as large as 96 metres (314.9 feet) tall, 225 metres (738.2 feet) long, and as heavy as 14,200 tons (31.3 million lb). The bucket-wheel itself can be over 70 feet in diameter with as many as 20 buckets, each of which can hold over 15 cubic metres of material. BWEs have also advanced with respect to the extreme conditions in which they are now capable of operating. Many BWEs have been designed to operate in climates with temperatures as low as -45°C (-49°F). Developers are now moving their focus toward automation and the use of electrical power.
Read more about this topic: Bucket-wheel Excavator
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