First Quantum Cobre Copper Mine – Urgent Supply of Flexible Hose

In 2019, the senior mechanical engineer at First Quantum Minerals’ Cobre mine in Panama was concerned about an imminent hose failure that could impact water supply to the processing plant.

The 16, DN600 mining hoses that connected to pumps on floating barges were leaking, which was stopping water supply to the plant. It was clear that the supplied end connections weren’t suitable for this application and had torn away from the hose ends.

We recommended building integral spigots into the ends of new Slurryflex hoses to avoid end connections being a weak point. We staggered production to let him replace the most damaged hoses first, with the four shipped from Brisbane in less than two weeks.

The engineer no longer had to stress about a failure that could stop production.

Three years on, we checked in to see how the hoses were performing and the engineer says: “The Slurryflex hoses are still installed and haven’t leaked once from the day they were installed.”

We’re happy to help solve his problem and see our Australian-made hoses used on a South American mine site.