Hundreds of thousands of SSAB expandable rock bolts – no problem

Cimertex provides Portuguese metal mines with SSAB ERB expandable rock bolts in the hundreds of thousands without any issues. Customers have tried other suppliers but have returned to SSAB ERB when they encountered quality problems leading to increased maintenance of the rock bolting rigs.

“From our experience with mining and tunnelling, we looked for the best quality ERB available to distribute and contacted SSAB. Our SSAB ERB bolts are by far the market leaders because of quality and logistics,” says Cimertex’s Álvaro Bastos. “When our customers source the bolts, they also expect a high level of local service, and we have a structure to provide that. By setting up consignment stock at the sites we guarantee flexibility to handle any customer needs. The support from SSAB is world-class, from quality and traceability to sales management.”

The Portuguese company Somincor, a subsidiary of Lundin Mining, operates the Neves-Corvo underground copper and zinc mine. The amount of copper processed is around 2.6 million tonnes per year.

Due to the company’s high safety standards and safety culture, Somincor’s main requirement on the bolts is performance. The capacity and the behavior of the support when applied and after application is what matters the most.

In Somincor’s operation, SSAB ERB is applied as primary support in the production phases. Somincor is currently using uncoated SSAB ERB. This works even if the ground is challenging with sulphide, since the production phase is rather short. However, according to Mr. Machado, coated bolts could be a viable alternative for this mine.