Alimak Hek - Lifts for the Mining and Tunnelling Industries

Wherever a lift for inspection, emergency, or interlevel hoisting is required in mines and underground shafts, the Alimak rack and pinion lift is the most economical choice. It requires no machine room, can be installed at any inclination, and provides a time-saving, safe, and comfortable transport facility for men and materials, even in very harsh or demanding environments. The deepest installation to date extends 650m.

Alimak Hek has 60 years experience with more than 30,000 installations in some of the world’s toughest environments, including several hundred lifts used in a variety of applications for mines and tunnels all over the world.

Over the years, the Alimak lift has come to be associated with reliability and superior performance, and our commitment to technical and managerial excellence has earned us ISO 9001 certification.

Lifts for the mining industry

The Alimak lift is the perfect solution for underground, as well as aboveground mining industry applications, such as pelletizing plants, smelters, concentrators, and other ore processing plants.

A main wire rope hoist, suitable for carrying heavy loads at relatively fast speeds, is the primary means of vertical access for men and materials in an underground mine. Alimak rack and pinion lifts are ideally suited for providing the secondary, emergency vertical access required by mine safety regulations.

Alimak lifts are also used to provide a simple and economical means of connecting different levels further out in the tunnel system and for transporting men and material between the levels and the stopes. The lift can be installed easily, and the cost is moderate because no machine room is needed.

At crushing plants, where the operator has to control feeders, bins and conveyors, which are installed at different levels, the Alimak lift may offer the best solution for rapid movement between levels.

Recent projects:

• Aitik copper mine, Sweden - seven lifts for different aboveground applications
• Kazzinc, Kazakstan - one lift in a zinc mine
• Voskhod-Oriel, Kazakstan - one lift in a chrome mine
• Kiruna iron ore mine, Sweden - one 9t capacity lift
• Malmberget iron ore mine, Sweden - one service lift at the pelletising plant
• Sala Silver mine, Sweden - two lifts for public use
• Norilsk, Russia - five explosion-protected lifts in a nickel mine
• Freeport, Indonesia - service and emergency lift in a 640m vertical shaft
• ALROSA Company, Russia - interlevel transport in a diamond mine
• Almagrera, Spain - emergency/escape lift in a mine ventilation shaft

Lifts for tunnel ventilation shafts

Alimak rack and pinion lifts provide reliable and efficient access in a great number of road and railway tunnel shafts around the world. They are used for the transportation of personnel and materials, for inspection, maintenance, and emergency escape. They adapt to inclinations, curves, and tight spaces, and climb deep down through the earth's crust. The first Alimak shaft lift was installed in Austria in 1975 and was used to inspect the 600m-high ventilation shafts in the tunnel under the Tauern pass. Three Alimak construction hoists were used for vertical transportation of men and materials during the construction of the English Channel Tunnel, UK, and nine Alimak lifts are providing emergency escape at the Copenhagen metro, Denmark.

Since the mid-90s, Alimak shaft lifts have been installed in a number of tunnels in the south of Germany and Switzerland, and also in tunnel shafts in South Korea, UK, Hong Kong, Ireland, and other countries worldwide.

Examples:

• Copenhagen Metro, Denmark – nine lifts for emergency escape
• Taipei Metro, Taiwan – six lifts
• Cologne-Frankfurt high-speed rail line, Germany – 24 material hoists for emergency transportation
• Madrid Metro project, Spain – three lifts inside tunnel boring machines (TBM)

About Alimak Hek

The Alimak Hek Group is the world's leading supplier of rack and pinion mast climbing equipment and added-value services for both temporary and permanent installations, providing the most cost-efficient, reliable, and flexible vertical access solutions for people and materials in the construction and general industry.

Alimak Hek, with manufacturing in Europe, Asia, and North America, operates wholly owned sales and rental companies in some 20 locations around the world, and has over 50 representatives in other locations.