Delivering advanced engine protection available for off-highway diesel vehicles, the latest family of products from the company includes Fleetguard’s NanoForce Air filters, NanoNet fuel filters, SpiraTec lube filters and OAT life of engine coolants. The company said that the combination of these technologies can enhance engine protection by up to 13 times, extend service intervals by up to four times, reduce annual maintenance hours by up to 50% and reduce annual commodity costs by up to 30%.

Cummins Filtration will unveil these products and more at MINExpo 2016 which is being held in Las Vegas, US, from September 26-28.

“What we did was compare them to the most quality-relevant competitor products at the time, and our own,” said Gary Ross, director of global high horsepower business for Cummins Filtration. “We’ve not just improved the efficiency of filtering particles, but have also been able to improve the size protection of the particles – we now have higher efficiency with small particles.”

Fleetguard’s latest nanofibre filter products for air, lube and fuel filters can provide 99.99% filtration efficiency. Nanofibres, with a diameter smaller than a human hair, capture particles at a submicron level before they can reach engine components such as pumps, injectors, pistons, rings, and liners.

Ross told Mining Magazine: “We’ve been developing the media for many years, and then we’ve been trying to put the media into different types of filter products. Fuel filters were the first priority, because the fuel systems on equipment are becoming more and more stringent because of tighter fuel standards - the pressure have gone up substantially, tolerances have gone down substantially, and expectations for service life have also gone up substantially so we have to try to find a balance within it all.

“For example, your hair might be 70μm in diameter; the particles that the standards ask us to protect today go down to 4μm; however we’re finding that the fuel systems are asking us to protect down as low as 2μm. You can’t do that with normal filter media, so that’s where nanotechnology started to really come to the fore.

“Doing it in labs was the easy part, then doing it in the field was another phase, but then doing it as a complete bundle and getting the optimum result, that was the final phase.”

According to Cummins Filtration, Fleetguard NanoNet fuel filters and NanoForce air filters can provide unrivalled engine protection for all high-horsepower (HHP) engine platforms - EPA non-certified, Tier 1 HPI engines, Tier 2 and above MCRS engines.

Ross explained: “We focus on the high-horsepower equipment. The reason we started there with a really big push is because when something fails in HHP equipment, the costs are substantially more.”

In addition to the added protection, the company stated that Fleetguard’s family of nanofibre filter products has set a new 1,000 hour standard service interval that reduces downtime, while ensuring ample safety margins, thus maximising total cost of ownership benefits.

Ross commented that the new 1,000 hours service interval sets a new standard in filtration that provides better equipment protection and lower total cost of ownership for mine operators.

He added: “Large engines need the cleanest fuel, oil and coolant and plenty of air flow. Traditional filter technology can limit lubricant and air flow as they quickly become plugged. This means loss of horsepower, decreased fuel economy, more frequent filter replacements and more costly equipment downtime. Cummins Filtration’s Fleetguard NanoForce air filters, NanoNet fuel filters, StrataPore coolant & hydraulic filters along with ES Compleat OAT coolants tackle these problems to deliver the highest standards of filtration while, at the same time, maintaining engine performance.”

This can be seen in practice in the global programme by Cummins Filtration aimed at delivering cost reductions to mining companies in the wake of plummeting commodity costs. The business carried out a 12-month filtration optimisation programme with Komatsu at Anglo American’s Dawson coal mine in Queensland, Australia, to demonstrate that new technology Fleetguard filters provide both better protection and lower total cost of ownership for mine operators.

Following a field test involving a Komatsu 830E haul truck powered by a Cummins QSK60 HPI engine, Cummins was able to confirm cost savings of 60% and a service life of 1,000 hours minimum, through reduced filter and oil consumption alone. When applied to Dawson’s fleet of 14 Komatsu 830E trucks, savings in excess of US$220,000 per year would be realised while slashing servicing hours by 74%.

Category	Historical mine service intervals (hours)	Actual interval achieved (hours)	New service interval (hours)
Fuel filter	500	3,316	2,000
Lube oil	500	1,057	1,000
Lube filter	1,000	1,973	1,000
Air filter	1,000	3,400	2,000
Water filter	500	4,000	4,000
Maintenance hours per truck per year	43	12	74% reduction of maintenance hours and 60% reduction in costs

Ross told MM: “We did trials in different parts of the world with different qualities of fuels and oils, and we’ve done work with Komatsu, Hitachi, Liebherr, Terex, Atlas Copco, etc. Whenever we do that we partner with the OEM to make sure they’re part of the trial, and we partner with the fuel and oil companies to make sure that everyone’s aligned with the data we’ve got.

“In this case, we were able to get everything wrapped up in time, get customer and OEM quotes, and more importantly have the data confirmed that the theory and reality were the same – in fact, a little better – because I’m not here to talk about ideals and dreams, it is more about what we can do than what we would like to be able to do.

“We’ve got lots of other results, just this example was particularly good because we wrapped it up and did a year of validation work with the site, and then we had a lot of time after the fact to prove that the results were maintained. That was the most important thing – you don’t want to do a trial and just drop off. Komatsu was one of the most proactive of all the OEMs on all this work as well. So that’s why we chose that site, but we’ve had multiple examples in Canada, Chile, Africa, Indonesia, you name it – basically wherever there are mines.”

Fleetguard filter and coolant products can be viewed at Cummins Filtration’s stand at MINExpo 2016.