In 2025, a miniaturized adaptive transportation project was successfully implemented for a thin-seam coal mine in Shaanxi Province, China.
This coal mine operates in thin seams with a main coal thickness of only 1.2 to 1.8 meters, resulting in low-height, narrow underground roadways. Traditional monorail equipment, with its excessive size, could not adapt to the roadway space. The mine needed to transport small materials such as support supplies and equipment parts, but previously relied on manual handling, which was inefficient, labor-intensive, and severely constrained mining efficiency. There was an urgent need for a miniaturized, flexible monorail system.
Addressing the spatial constraints of thin-seam mines, we developed and customized a miniaturized explosion-proof lithium-ion battery monorail. With a body height of only 1.1 meters and width of 0.8 meters, it is ideally suited for narrow roadways with a minimum height of 1.8 meters. The system features a 2-drive traction design with a maximum load capacity of 5 tons, meeting the requirements for small material transport. The equipment structure was optimized using lightweight materials to reduce track bearing pressure, adapting perfectly to the conditions of thin-seam mine roadways. The system is simple to operate, enabling single-person remote control, and is equipped with safety features such as emergency braking and anti-derailment devices to ensure underground operational safety. With a range of 12 to 16 kilometers, it satisfies the mine’s daily transportation needs.
Since its deployment, the system has completely replaced manual handling, increasing material transfer efficiency by over 70%. With just one to two operators per shift, all transportation tasks are completed, significantly reducing labor intensity. The equipment’s strong adaptability allows it to move flexibly through narrow roadways without any passage obstacles, successfully solving the challenge of small material transport in thin-seam mines. This project provides a brand-new solution for upgrading auxiliary transport in thin-seam coal mines across China. Subsequently, as the mine expanded its mining scale, it adopted our miniaturized monorail products exclusively.
