SPECIAL ARTICLES

Pretoria Branch - SAIMM technical evening 26 September 2012, University of Pretoria

The SAIMM Pretoria Branch's monthly technical evening was hosted by ESCO at the University of Pretoria. The evening was well supported with some 55 delegates attending. The topic of the presentation by Terry Briscoe was the evolution of the ESCO Dragline Bucket. Terry, Senior Engineer Technology Development, has been with ESCO for 42 years and will be retiring towards the end of the year. Norman Murison, the Services Manager South Africa, first gave a short overview of the ESCO company, then Terry covered the models applied in the design of dragline buckets and case studies were discussed. The audience was entertained by Terry's enthusiasm, theoretical knowledge, and practical hands-on experience gained at a vast number of global dragline mining operations. Comments from the audience included: 'we did not know how much research and development goes into the design and manufacture of a dragline bucket'; 'Terry's enthusiasm and passion showed throughout the presentation and the results are seen in the latest dragline bucket design'; 'we enjoyed his presentation style'; and 'this again shows that mining engineering and engineering design and manufacture principles come together.'

The evening's snacks and refreshments were generously sponsored by ESCO. ESCO is a leading independent, global developer and manufacturer of highly engineered wear and replacement products used in resource mining, infrastructure, power generation, aerospace and industrial applications that are essential to the productivity of their customers' machines.

W. de Graaf
Branch Chairman