Magnetic particle inspection of mining shovel boom at Alberta oilsands operation

NDT & Inspection for Mining

Mining equipment lives on fatigue: millions of load cycles working booms, frames and structures until cracks start at welds and section changes. CIC provides NDT for mining operations and their contractors — crack detection, weld inspection and failure analysis for the machines and structures where an unplanned failure costs tonnes per hour.

Equipment and Structures We Cover

• Draglines and shovels — boom chords, welds, pins and structural details on scheduled crack-detection cycles

• Haul trucks — frame and attachment-point inspection, post-event verification after impacts and overloads

• Crushers, screens and conveyors — structural welds, shafts and high-stress components

• Plant structures — bins, chutes, towers and gallery steel that vibration works on continuously

• Repair verification — confirming weld repairs restored the member before the machine returns to load

The Testing Methods Mines Buy Most

Mining iron fails by fatigue, so the method list starts with crack detection and works outward:

• Fatigue cracks in booms, frames and structures → MPI — the workhorse method on mining steel, fast over big weldments

• Pins, shafts and section changes → UT, reaching the internal cracking surface methods can't see

• Non-magnetic components → LPI on stainless, manganese and non-ferrous parts

• Critical repairs on high-value members → PAUT imaging to size cracks before repair and verify after

• Wear and section loss on chutes, bins and structures → UT thickness surveys

• Repeat failures → lab failure analysis, so the third crack in the same chord gets a root cause instead of a fourth

Planned Around Maintenance Windows

Mine maintenance runs on scheduled downtime, and inspection either fits the window or costs another one. CIC crews mobilize to shutdown schedules — nights and remote sites included — with scopes agreed in advance so wrench time and inspection time share the machine instead of fighting over it.

From Crack Detection to Root Cause

Finding the crack is half the value; knowing why it started is the other half. When a component fails or a crack pattern repeats, our independent metallurgical lab determines the mechanism — so the fix lands in design, operation or maintenance, wherever the cause actually lives.