EACON AHS at Zijinshan mine: design lessons for long tunnel haul layouts
Reviewed by Joe Ashwell
First reported on International Mining – News
30 Second Briefing
EACON Mining Technology has validated an autonomous haulage capability at Zijinshan copper-gold mine that keeps trucks running driverless through extended tunnel sections where GNSS/RTK positioning and network connectivity drop out. The system uses on-board perception and localisation to operate without full dependence on conventional high-definition maps, targeting long underground or covered haul segments rather than short blind spots. For mine planners and automation teams, this points to AHS designs that can tolerate sustained signal loss in complex pit–portal–tunnel layouts.
Technical Brief
- Capability targets long covered or underground haul segments linking open-pit workings to processing or waste facilities.
- On-board perception stack is designed to infer drivable corridor geometry without pre-surveyed HD map dependence.
- Localisation fuses vehicle odometry with perception-derived landmarks to manage cumulative drift during signal outages.
- System architecture anticipates intermittent mine communications, buffering commands and telemetry for delayed synchronisation.
- Safety logic maintains collision avoidance and speed control using only local sensors during connectivity blackouts.
- Design focus is mixed pit–portal–tunnel traffic, where conventional surface AHS logic struggles with repeated signal loss.
- For other complex mining layouts, similar approaches could reduce manual driving in long transition zones.
Our Take
EACON Mining Technology’s validation work at the Zijinshan mine sits alongside its large-scale deployment on more than 1,500 battery-electric trucks, signalling that the company is now stress‑testing its AHS not just for fleet size but for more complex geometries like extended tunnels.
Our database shows EACON’s AHS being trialled in open‑pit gold operations such as Norton Gold Fields’ Mulgarrie mine, so proving the system in tunnel sections at Zijinshan suggests it is being positioned as a platform that can bridge both surface and more constrained underground-style environments.
The recent MOU between EACON and XCMG focused on overseas markets, particularly Australia, implies that successful tunnel‑section validation at Zijinshan could quickly be leveraged as a reference case when marketing autonomous haulage into Australian mines with ramp and decline-heavy layouts.
Prepared by collating external sources, AI-assisted tools, and Geomechanics.io’s proprietary mining database, then reviewed for technical accuracy & edited by our geotechnical team.
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