SALES, RENTALS, PARTS AND SERVICE 2020 Bantree Rd. Ottawa, ON. K1B 5A4 Ph: 613-737-3963 Call Eastrock, your heavy equipment specialists for drilling, rock breaking and earthmoving. With over 25 years of experience in the heavy equipment industry, we are a leading, multi- line, dealer carrying high quality brands such as Furukawa rock drills and hydraulic breakers along with MDT foundation drills and piling rigs for all of Eastern Canada. We also have Doosan heavy loaders and excavators to serve your construction, landscaping, quarries and agriculture needs in Ottawa, Prescott Russel and Stormont Dundas Glengarry counties. Our fully equipped facilities allow us to provide outstanding support to meet and exceed your expectations. Quality products, factory trained technicians, mobile service and a large inventory of parts will keep you up and working to get the job done. WINTER 2019 AVENUES 13 TRANSPORT TECHNOLOGY ELECTRIC EQUIPMENT While there doesn’t seem to be much on the horizon for electric heavy-haul trucks, development of heavy equipment such as loaders that employ electric, energy storage or hybrid systems is moving forward quite quickly. Caterpillar makes two models of hydraulic excavators with energy storage, the 336F L XE and the 349F L XE, which the company says are both large enough for use in quarries. “Energy is stored in the form of pressurized hydraulic oil contained in an accumulator and it’s released when the machine has high energy demand, normally during digging,” notes Sprouls. “The system reduces fuel consumption by about 15 per cent. Electronically-controlled hydraulic valving is the key to the system.” Two other, larger Caterpillar excavators (the 374F and 390F, which the firm says are popular in large aggregate operations) also use electronically-controlled hydraulic valves, but they do not have energy storage. “Nevertheless, the precise hydraulic control can deliver as much as a 30 per cent reduction in fuel consumption on these high-produc- tion machines,” Sprouls says. “The point is that technologies other than hybrid (energy storage) systems can have big impacts on diesel fuel consumption and costs to the aggregates producer.” Caterpillar recently launched the 988K XE, the firm’s first wheel loader with a high-efficiency electric drive system, which Sprouls says sees extensive use in aggregates operations. The 988K XE decreases fuel consumption by up to 28 per cent overall and by up to 49 per cent in face-loading applications, significantly reducing carbon footprint. It’s the result of over 15 years of research and development, including over four years of stringent testing in a range of applications. “Again, this loader is diesel- electric, not battery electric,” Sprouls says. “There is no energy storage (hybrid) system in use on this machine. Caterpillar also has been offering a diesel-electric dozer, the D7E, for many years. It is not a hybrid either.” The electric drive system of the 988K XE replaces the traditional mechanical transmis- sion and torque converter of a standard 988K. Caterpillar says that its new generator, motor and inverter components all work together to increase machine responsiveness and improve efficiency in both truck loading and load-and-carry tasks (the latter by up to 10 per cent). Maintenance costs of the 988K XE are also lower. For example, the oil change intervals are double (2,000 hours) that of the 988K, and it uses 40 per cent less powertrain oil. Additionally, engine life is longer. ELECTRIC LOADERS AND TRACTORS In the fall of 2017, Caterpillar’s Underground Mining Group shipped an R1300G proof-of- concept battery electric loader to a mine site in Canada, which Caterpillar says is another step in bringing a lithium battery-based load-haul-dump technology to market. Caterpillar says the prototype (including a rapid onboard charging system) was produced to help mining industry customers develop deeper mines where ventilation costs must be minimized to make the mine viable (an important means of reducing ventilation demand is through electric/no-emissions equipment). “Both diesel emissions and heat generation require increased ventilation to make the environment safe for miners,” says Sprouls. “The downside for customers is increased purchase cost for the system – the vehicle itself, batteries and the rapid charging unit.” The R1300G proof-of-concept is actu- ally an older machine that has no efficient electro-hydraulics, a situation that forces its