What you will learn
- How truck and loader allocation is planned each shift
- What cycle times, payloads and queue times tell a dispatcher
- How breakdowns and refuelling change the plan mid-shift
- What operators, dispatchers and maintenance each see
- Where fleet management ends and mine planning begins
What this project is
Open-pit production is a cycle: a loader fills a truck, the truck hauls to a crusher or waste dump, dumps, and returns. The fleet system plans that cycle across the shift. It assigns trucks to loaders, balances the fleet so no loader waits for trucks and no truck queues too long, and tracks whether the tonnes moved match the shift plan. When a truck breaks down or a loader moves to a new bench, the plan changes, and the system should show the effect of that change before the dispatcher commits to it.
The system lives on cycle data: load time, haul time, dump time, return time and queue time, for every truck. Those numbers reveal where time is lost. Long queues at one loader, slow haul roads, or a crusher that cannot keep up all show up in cycle times before they show up in missed production. A dispatcher who can see cycle times by loader, road and shift can fix the bottleneck rather than simply adding more trucks to a broken circuit.
Core features
- Shift planning with truck and loader allocation against the production target
- Live fleet positions and status: loading, hauling, dumping, queuing, down for maintenance
- Cycle time tracking and reporting by loader, route and shift
- Breakdown and refuelling handling, with automatic reallocation of the remaining fleet
- Production tracking against plan, in tonnes moved and by material type
- Operator messaging and assignment updates sent to truck cab displays
How it is built
- Model the pit first: benches, loaders, crushers, dumps and haul roads, with travel times for each route
- Build shift planning and assignment, then live status from truck and loader reports
- Add cycle time reporting and production tracking against plan
- Connect breakdown reporting so a down truck immediately frees its assignment for reallocation
- Pilot on one pit area for a full shift cycle, comparing planned versus actual tonnes before wider use
Technology considerations
Position and status data drive everything. Trucks report by GPS on surface, and the system must turn those reports into status changes without constant manual input. Cycle times need clean event boundaries: when loading ends and hauling begins must be defined the same way for every truck, or comparisons between trucks and shifts are meaningless. The dispatcher screen should show the whole circuit at a glance, because a dispatcher managing one loader in isolation will starve another.
Integration with maintenance matters. A truck due for service, or flagged by an operator defect report, should appear in the fleet plan before it breaks down mid-circuit. Similarly, production data should flow to mine planning, so the plan for tomorrow reflects what was actually moved today, not what was hoped for.
For the first version, dispatch one pit area for a full shift cycle: truck and loader assignments against the shift plan, cycle times by route, and production against plan shown during the shift, not just at its end. Dispatchers judge the system on whether it keeps loaders working without creating long truck queues. A system that does that for one area, with breakdown reallocation working, is ready to cover the whole pit.
Challenges to plan for
- A loader that waits for trucks while trucks queue at another loader
- Haul road conditions that slow every cycle and are not captured in the plan
- Breakdowns that cascade, because the remaining fleet cannot cover two circuits at once
- Cycle data that is inconsistent because status changes are recorded differently by different operators
Who it is for, and its limits
This suits an open-pit mine operator or a mining contractor running a truck fleet. It fits operations where production depends on truck cycles and where the fleet is large enough that manual dispatch cannot keep up. It does not fit a small quarry with a handful of trucks on fixed routes, and it is not a mine planning system: it executes the shift plan, it does not design the pit.
A fleet system does not create trucks or fix haul roads. It makes the fleet you have work as a circuit, and shows where the circuit is losing time. Costs vary with fleet size and pit complexity, so confirm with a quote after the pit and fleet are mapped.
Frequently asked questions
How are trucks assigned to loaders?
By the shift plan and the current state of each circuit: a truck is sent where it keeps loaders working without creating long queues. The dispatcher can override assignments, and overrides are recorded.
What happens when a truck breaks down?
It is marked down, its assignment is freed, and the remaining fleet is rebalanced across loaders. The breakdown is passed to maintenance with the truck's location and fault.
What is a cycle time?
The time for one complete circuit: loading, hauling, dumping and returning, including any queue time. Long cycle times on one route point to a bottleneck on that route.
Does the system track tonnes moved?
Yes, from payload data and load counts, by material type and destination. That gives production against plan during the shift, not just at the end of it.
Can dispatchers see the whole pit?
That is the point of the dispatcher screen: every truck, loader and circuit in one view, so a change at one loader is judged against its effect on the whole fleet.