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March 2016
MODERN MINING
31
feature
DIAMONDS
Looking west towards the
main plant terrace. In the
foreground is the scrubber
feed conveyor.
piping and platework (SMPP) contractor and
CUSA the electrical, control and instrumenta-
tion (EC&I) contractor.
“People sometimes ask me what are the
keys to a successful project,” says Brown. “The
answer is that you need to do your homework
in terms of all your studies and planning, you
need to put a good team together and then
you – and all your contractors – need to work
extremely hard. There are simply no short cuts
– although I can’t deny that it does help to have
a bit of luck! Certainly, at Liqhobong we’ve
ticked off all the boxes. What most impresses
me is the work ethic on site – our own people
are highly committed and their enthusiasm has
been matched by our contractors, who have all
performed very well.”
While Liqhobong is currently on schedule,
this is on the basis of a revised timeline which
was announced in mid-2015. “Originally, we
were planning to be producing by the end of the
second quarter of this year,” notes Brown. “We
were, however, delayed by the amount of over-
burden removal on the primary crusher and
plant terraces being far greater than anticipated.
The weather was also not kind to us during the
early months of construction and in November
2014 Liqhobong received double the normal
annual rainfall in just a few days. We’ve now
recovered from these setbacks and currently
are very satisfied with progress, with almost all
our work packages either on or ahead of sched-
ule or, at the worst, just marginally behind and
catching up fast.”
As of January this year, design and engineer-
ing of the project was 99,8 % complete and
procurement 99 % complete. Fabrication was
96,1%complete versus the target of 91,9%. The
civils package was at 68 %, the RSF at 94,6 %
and the earthworks at 99,5 %. As one would
expect, the SMPP and the EC&I packages are
at earlier stages, at 13,5 % and 3,5 % complete
respectively. As regards accommodation, 18 out
of 24 prefabricated units – all with underfloor
heating – were on site and occupied. These
have been supplied by National & Overseas
Modular Construction of Bloemfontein and
apart from housing construction workers will
also provide the mine’s permanent accommo-
dation. A new, fully staffed and equipped clinic
has also been commissioned.
Some of the quantities involved at Liqhobong
are quite formidable, with the RSF, for exam-
ple, involving the placing of 1,5 million cubic
metres of rock and earth for the starter wall and
the main plant terrace about 1,2 million cubic
metres of earthworks. The project has also
involved some road construction. It was deter-
mined as long ago as 2012 that the existing road
Prefabricated accommo-
dation. When this photo
was taken in January, 18
out of 24 units had been
completed.