Cat® Roof Supports to Extend Whitehaven’s Narrabri North Longwall

Whitehaven Coal Limited has placed an order for 50 Cat® longwall roof supports to extend its Narrabri North longwall from 300 meters to 400 meters—to increase production and reduce costs. Already regarded as one of the most productive longwalls in Australia, the current system set a monthly production record of 1.057 million tonnes in April. The mine in New South Wales will start mining its first 400-meter-wide panel in the second half of 2017. Narrabri is operating a complete Cat longwall mining system including an EL3000 Shearer, roof supports, AFCPF6 Face Conveyor and BSLPF6 Beam Stage Loader with crusher and boot end. The order of Cat roof supports includes 43 face roof supports and 7 gate road supports with 2.05-meter spacing, 2.25- to 4.70-meter height range, 450-mm leg diameter and 13,000-kN support capacity.