One of the firm’s first metal mine customers, North Parkes in Australia, which installed its first unit in 2003, is adding a new crushing station approximately 550 m below the surface. The BK63-75 crusher is designed to run at an average capacity of 900 mt/h copper ore to provide a final product size of P80=150 mm. It should be in operation by the end of 2008.

Two more BK 63-75 jaw gyratory crushers are to be installed in an Australian underground diamond mine also using the block caving method which, while proven to be highly cost effective, is likely to provide a relatively coarse run-of-mine material with unpredictable maximum lump size that can be crushed effectively using the jaw gyratory crusher. These two crushers will be supplied in April 2008 and September 2008 for a new underground development and are intended to achieve an average throughput rate of 900 mt/h and a final grain size of P80=150 mm.

The first use of a jaw gyratory crusher for metal mining in Europe, and the first for primary crushing in a copper open-pit mine, is at Geotechmin’s Ellatzite Copper near Etropole in Bulgaria. ThyssenKrupp received an order for the supply of the key components of a new primary crushing station incorporating one BK 63-75 jaw gyratory crusher model which is scheduled to begin operating by year-end 2007. The crusher is designed to run at an average capacity of 1,800 mt/h but will achieve a maximum capacity of 2,500 mt/h and provide a final product size of 200 mm. Ore is hauled to the crushers by four new Hitachi EH1700 and 28 older trucks.