Maintenance
Increasing hydraulic uptime for the mining industry WITH A LONG HISTORY SPANNING THREE GENERATIONS, BOA HYDRAULICS HAS TRANSFORMED AND EVOLVED TO BECOME ONE OF THE FASTEST GROWING HYDRAULIC COMPANIES, PROVIDING A TURN-KEY HYDRAULIC HOSE REPAIR AND MAINTENANCE SOLUTION TO THOSE WORKING AROUND HEAVY MACHINERY.
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aintenance is an important part of working with machinery, particularly in the mining and resources industry. When a hydraulic hose bursts onsite, the compounding expenses to a mining operation is extreme, not just in terms of fixing the broken part, but the cost of machine downtime can be severe, especially when it is a frontline machine. On-site maintenance is the most practical solution and enables a company to minimise downtime, through using existing clients already on-site working on their machinery to add hydraulic hose repairs to their service. This allows diesel fitters to drastically reduce downtime for their clients, becoming the one-stop-shop for their machinery. BOA Hydraulics has spent many years listening to its customers and from this have developed an onsite mobile hydraulic hose repair solution that eliminates hydraulic downtime and dramatically increases productivity and profitability. BOA Hydraulics chief executive officer and co-founder Simon Boakes says the aim of the company is to serve its customers and to be recognised in the hydraulics market for giving businesses back their control and autonomy. “The problem we are trying to solve at BOA is that 37 per cent of unscheduled downtime for a hydraulic machine is due
BOA Hydraulics produced the BOApod Hydraulic Hose Repair unit.
to hydraulic hose failure in the mining sector,” Boakes says. “This is nearly every second time a machine is down it is due to a hydraulic hose failure. “The downtime isn’t just the time for the machine to be fixed, it’s the waiting time for the hydraulic hose technician to get to site, or a heavy diesel fitter to travel literally hours to get a replacement hose from town.” Boakes says there is a large amount of associated costs with downtime when a hydraulic hose breaks. There is both the labour cost for the mining company and for the heavy diesel fitter who doesn’t get paid to travel into town to get a hose made. “There is also the cost of the machine. A frontline machine costs thousands an hour if stopped and the line-up of machines reliant on the frontline machine also stop, causing a large accumulation of costs - and the crazy thing is it isn’t fully recognised,” Boakes says. As part of its commitment to making
SAFETOWORK.COM.AU 30 JAN-FEB 2022
the lives of its customers easier, BOA Hydraulics produced the BOApod Hydraulic Hose Repair unit, which is an integral part of the BOA Onsite Hydraulic Hose Solution. This all-weather, allterrain mobile unit enables the user to assemble hydraulic hoses following the same principles used in original manufacturing facilities, out there in the field. Another key pillar that makes up the BOA Solution is the BOAhub – an innovative inventory management and reordering app. Tightly integrated with the BOApod, the BOAhub’s scanto-reorder function makes inventory ordering a breeze onsite. Boakes says the company works with its customers to make sure they get the best support and assistance available. “We train and BOA-certify our customers, and we offer re-training at any time,” Boakes says. “We provide sales support, marketing support including customerbranded brochures, business cards, cab
