While the current tough market conditions in the coal mining sector might dissuade some companies from maintaining an active presence, this is not the case for slurry pump OEM, Pump and Abrasion Technologies (PABT).

In fact, recently appointed GM SHAWN DONLY tells GERARD PETER, that the company is fully committed to creating long-term partnerships with its coal customers.

This article first appeared in Mining Review Africa Issue 3, 2020 Read the full digimag here or subscribe to receive a print copy here

Through its innovative Curve pump range, parts availability, 24/7 customer service and onsite field service offerings, PABT’s slurry pumps are currently in use at some of South Africa’s largest and most well established coal operations, with a strong presence in eMalahleni and Middleberg regions. In fact, due to customer demand, PABT will be opening a branch in Middleberg.  

While it has proven that the Curve range can save coal mining companies up to 50% in Total Ownership Cost (TOC), Donly believes that PAB’s strong footprint in this sector is primarily down to the company’s ethos of forging strong partnerships with its clients.

“We engage with our customers on a one-to-one level to understand their needs and challenges and then come up with a solution that takes into account the uniqueness of the coal industry. Through these partnerships we create a win-win situation that saves our customers money and reduces their cost per ton,” explains Donly.

Curve pumps also contribute towards improved health and safety conditions in the coal sector.

“We improve worker safety during the assembly and disassembly as well as during maintenance of our pumps thanks to their unique design and to our full range of fitting tools,” Donly states.

Furthermore, he explains that Curve pumps offer the added benefit of saving companies between 8 – 10% in energy compared to traditional standard pumps.

When PABT introduced its Curve range in 2016, it revolutionised the slurry pump sector. Today, the company continues to advance its product range.

“We take innovation and R&D seriously and part of our ongoing process of innovation is engagement with our customers. This allows us to make specific changes and alterations to our pumps to help our customers improve performance in their sector.”

Furthermore, Donly adds that PABT also carries a comprehensive range of high-quality replacement parts for older technology slurry pumps, offering customers the same after-sales and customer support.

These savings assist customers to transition to the newer Curve pump technology which the company is able to retrofit to legacy pumping systems with minimal changes to the piping required.

In order to demonstrate the Curve range’s efficiency, PABT has a team of onsite pumping system specialist application engineers who review a client’s set-up and recommend adjustments that match their budgets and their objectives.

The teams then run onsite trials and presents these findings to a customer. In this way, the client makes an informed choice when purchasing a PABT slurry pump solution.

Donly says that PABT has aspirations to continually grow its presence in the coal sector in South African and abroad.

“We believe our products ability to reduce costs is key to the success of the coal sector, particularly during tough market conditions – we deliver on what we promise.”

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