Scientific analysis firm WearCheck has extended its Zambian footprint with the construction of a purpose-built oil analysis laboratory in Kitwe, adding a second Zambian operation to the established Lumwana laboratory and extending WearCheck’s total investment into the Zambian economy.
Scheduled to open in July 2011, WearCheck’s Kitwe laboratory is strategically positioned to service the Copperbelt mining industry, but will also process oil samples from a range of premium product stone crusherother industries and plant hire companies throughout Zambia.
The new state-of-the-art laboratory will feature the full range of oil analysis equipment, matchimachine hammer millng those of Wear-Check’s other laboratories, including elemental spectrophotometers, viscometers, particle counters, Fourier transform infrared spectrometers, debris PAD preparation and fcrushing and screening plant for manganeseuel dilution determination, to mention a few.
This complements the WearCheck laboratory at Lumwana mine, which is also located on the Zambian Copperbelt.
Up to now, oil analysis customers in the Kitwe region were serviced by a sales branch at the offices of WearCheck’s holding company, Set Point Group, in Kitwe, where maintenance engineers in the region could buy oil analysis kits and drop off used oil and fuel samples. The Lumwana laboratory then processed these samples.
However, the new Kitwe laboratory will process samples on site, resulting in a faster sample turnaround time.
WearCheck MD Neil Robinson reports that the African interior is becoming an increasingly important market for South African companies in the mining, engineering, construction and transport sectors.
“WearCheck’s Zambian laboratories will offer better access to world-class lubricant analysis services and faster sample turn- around times for companies operating in this region,” says Robinson.
The new Kitwe operation is WearCheck’s seventh laboratory and forms part of a network which spans Southern Africa, and includes branches in India and Dubai
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