Cleaner oil, steadier uptime

Mechanically, the mobile equipment is comparable across underground applications. Motion supports J.H. Fletcher equipment – including jumbo drills used for drilling and bolting to support underground headings.

“From our side, J.H. Fletcher is core to what we do,” Dorahy says. “If it’s J.H. Fletcher gear in a hard rock operation, we can support it. If it’s a hydraulic system, we can maintain it, repair it, and rebuild it.”

The main distinction is the operating environment. Underground coal is treated as a gaseous, potentially explosive atmosphere, so electrics must be intrinsically safe or housed in engineered flameproof cabinets. Hard rock mines are generally non-gaseous, which allows more conventional electrical systems.

“The hydraulics themselves are much the same,” Dorahy says. “The big difference is the electrical safety requirements. In coal, electrics must be intrinsically safe or flameproof. In hard rock, you can often use more standard industrial or mobile electrical systems.”

That difference also affects access. “Hard rock is typically more accessible,” he adds. “In many cases you can drive a vehicle underground. In coal, access can be more restrictive and you’re often walking longer distances, with additional medicals, and inductions.”

Motion’s preference is to shift the conversation from emergency repairs to preventative maintenance – built around planned ‘down days’. Mines typically schedule servicing windows (for example, quarterly). Motion can attend, inspect to a checklist, and provide a service report with recommendations for the next outage.

“Planned maintenance is always better than chasing failures,” Dorahy says. “We can work to the site’s shutdown schedule, service to a checklist, then provide a report: what we checked, what we did, and what should be addressed next – including anything urgent that sits outside the normal scope.”

In many hard rock operations, hydraulic services extend beyond mobile underground equipment to the crushing and processing plant. Cone crushers, ore transfer systems, and associated hydraulic circuits often determine throughput and shutdown frequency.

“A lot of hard rock sites have a crushing and processing plant on site,” Dorahy says. “That fixed plant side is an area where we’ve got strong experience – maintenance, reliability reviews, and audits to improve system efficiency and uptime.”

Here, filtration and contamination control are central. “No matter where you look, dirty oil is the enemy,” he says. “Good filtration, good practices, and the right maintenance plan make a big difference.”

Large operations can be complex, with tight shutdown windows, and mixed skill sets across teams. In those environments, an external service partner can add consistency, specialist tooling, and repeatable maintenance practices across assets and sites. Motion has capacity to support nationally, including fly-in service for planned work and urgent breakdowns where needed.

“We have the capacity to service Australia-wide,” Dorahy says. “The east coast and WA are our strongest areas, but we regularly travel to site to complete planned maintenance or support critical work when required.”