Sandvik Mining and Rock Solutions in southern Africa has very effectively transitioned its operations to Khomanani, its new high-tech head office facility, workshop and manufacturing complex in Kempton Park, Johannesburg. The facility was officially opened by his Excellency President Cyril Ramaphosa today.

Representing an investment of R350 million, Khomanani – which accommodates approximately 500 Sandvik employees – consolidates the operations previously undertaken at five separate sites.  Sandvik’s full-time equivalent (FTE) forecast is 39 by end of December 2022 representing an 8% growth.

For the first time ever, the company now has its soft rock, hard rock and surface businesses all under one roof. Khomanani, which occupies a 62 000 m2 site, is one of Sandvik’s biggest and most advanced facilities globally and has the ability to produce underground loaders with over 60 % local content, allowing them to be designated as ‘Proudly South African’.

Developed in conjunction with Equites Property Fund, Khomanani is a bespoke facility comprising of an office building and three workshops. Two of the workshops are dedicated to the refurbishment and rebuilding of Sandvik machines – to OEM standards – from throughout the southern African region while the third is designed to assemble equipment locally.

The workshops are equipped with 23 docking bays and a combination of cranes up to 30-t capacity to facilitate the handling of equipment. The floors can support very high loads, including continuous miners weighing over 100 tonnes. The spacious site has a carefully designed road layout which allows heavy transport vehicles to move in and out of the property easily without the need for time-consuming manoeuvring.

The machines being assembled at Khomanani are the 12-tonne capacity LS312 flameproof loader for underground coal operations, as well as the LH115 and LH208 loaders, respectively of 5,5 tonne and 7,7 tonne capacity, for underground hard rock mining.

Not only are these machines being supplied to the southern African market but Sandvik can also export them. They are produced to the exact same quality standards as Sandvik machines manufactured at our overseas factories such as Tampere in Finland. Moreover, the company is able to produce them at a cost which is very competitive by global standards.

Sandvik is very proud of Khomanani’s ‘green’ credentials and the company has prioritised energy and water efficiency. Solar power, of course, forms an important part of the energy mix. There is already a shared solar facility which generates 500 kW and the company recently installed additional solar units in its own facility, which will be sufficient to take us entirely off the grid in the middle of the day under ideal conditions.”

Sandvik is committed to sustainability and has developed its BEV range of trucks and loaders. The TH665B truck with a payload capacity of 65 tonne was unveiled at Electra Mining Africa 2022. Commercial production of the unit, which ranks as the largest capacity BEV truck in the world, is planned for late 2023.