Features

SAF-Holland to the rescue

With a fleet of 30 Performance-Based Standards road trains and more to come, Odell Resources has all of its combinations specced with SAF-Holland’s 22S disc brake axles.

Odell Resources is a family-owned and operated mining service provider with more than 25 years of experience in the Western Australian mining sector.

The business itself has been around for just under 10 years, and its services revolve around mining contracting which involves it with open-pit loading and hauling along with mine bulk haulage services.

The company also offers heavy equipment rental solutions throughout the state with an extensive range of late-model, low hour Caterpillar equipment.

It can deliver these options to any site in WA backed by its 24-hour field service support along with its workshop and wash bay facilities.

Odell Resources has been using SAF-Holland’s axles and suspensions for over 15 years. After running them on a fleet of more than 50 road trains at his previous company – another large mining services business – managing director, Daniel Cox, knew it was the right choice for Odell’s on- and off-road applications in its 24-hour line haulage operations.

“I think it has held up, we get a good run out of SAF-Holland,” he said. “We perform over 37,000 kilometres per month on our road trains. As far as disc brakes go, they are lasting just under 300,000 kilometres before we do our changeouts.”

All of Cox’s Howard Porter Ultra Quads are fitted with SAF-Holland components. Due to the fleet’s high demands, having a quality axle and suspension manufacturer to rely on is key for Odell Resources.

“We expect high uptime on these with low maintenance to meet our targets each month,” Cox added.

“We have ships booked in advance and we’ve got to ensure we are delivering. We can’t send ships out half loaded so it’s very important we meet our tonnage requirements each month at the port. Availability now for good quality suspensions and axles is tight so we haven’t been interrupted too badly on our orders, but we’re getting the kilometres out of them with low maintenance.”

Odell Resources carries over 150 tonnes of iron ore per combination. These units don’t stop and are very rarely parked up – some of them have already travelled up to 300,000 kilometres in a very small amount of time.

So, in order to ensure they are always performing at their best, they are maintained regularly with weekly service intervals.

Majorly contributing to the longevity of the combinations, Cox says, is the SAF-Holland product.

“Low maintenance, that’s the biggest thing,” he said, “Reliability and low maintenance are our biggest takeaways from the product. Less downtime equals more utilisation and better production performance.

“All around, I just think it’s a great, reliable product. Performance is key in our industry. We work very remotely, so if we have any issues on the side of the road it could mean it takes up to five to seven hours before a mechanic can get out to those distances, so we heavily rely on good quality equipment.”

Demonstrating its position in the market, Cox says the SAF-Holland product has spoken for itself in his 15 years of experience dealing with it.

“We’ve had no issues with it, and the support’s been there in the background if we’ve needed it,” he added. “But we haven’t had any major issues at all with the SAF product. It does what it needs to do.”

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