Investing heavily in expertise by actively growing its engineering department will ensure that Booyco Electronics, as the local pioneer of proximity detection systems, remains ahead of the pack.

At the forefront of technological innovation in collision avoidance systems (CAS), Booyco Electronics is investing heavily in its expertise by actively growing its engineering department in the coming months.

“Engineering the solutions that will ensure safer working places is at the heart of our business,” says Pieter Wolfaardt, chief operations officer at Booyco Electronics. “Collision avoidance is a field that demands highly technical electronic devices as safety deterrents, and we are continually strengthening our capacity to develop and deliver these solutions.”

As the standards governing collision avoidance in the mining industry become more stringent, the technologies serving this need are evolving rapidly as well, says Wolfaardt.

Booyco Electronics has a large market share in South Africa, and its learnings from implementation across many mine sites are incorporated in its solutions offerings further underpinning the company’s commitment to industry best practice principles.

While engineering designs around Booyco products are often customised to meet specific customer and site applications, these are fully aligned with all legislative requirements for the South African mining industry including SANS Codes. The Booyco product range also conforms to the guidelines laid down by the Earth Moving Equipment Safety Round Table (EMESRT).

“It is our engineering team that develops the product offerings for our customers’ requirements, and the development process never ends,” he says. “They are involved in research and development, extensive testing, and ongoing upgrades.”

Wolfaardt highlights that the company is looking ahead to the kinds of technologies that will be required by 2025, and is aligning itself with that vision. All three of the company’s main product lines – CWS, CXS and PDS – are receiving constant attention and improvement.

Among the most important recent technical achievements has been a ‘scalable’ design that suits a wide range of customer requirements without them having to change hardware on the equipment. Rather, the firmware or the software can be updated on a continuous basis.

“Our increased engineering capacity will support customers who are still getting to grips with changing CAS requirements, especially those mines who are new to CAS,” he says. “Customers often request that our systems to be tested on their trackless mining machinery as they seek the optimal solution. With our increased capacity in the engineering department we can offer a highly systematic and professional service in terms of technology integration and on-site testing.”

The substantial current team of 18 engineers, artisans and technicians will grow to over 30 in the near future. Key qualifications in the department include electronics engineers as well as BTech degrees and National Diplomas, with qualified technicians undertaking most of the testing functions.

“Mining experience is also important in our team, as this improves the way we design and integrate systems for the real working environment in mines,” Wolfaardt concludes.