Sandvik’s powertrain centre in Lively wins Spicer TE50 certification

Sandvik’s powertrain centre in Lively, Ont., has joined an exclusive list of worldwide facilities that can officially service and remanufacture the Spicer TE50 transmission, following its certification this summer as an approved service centre for remanufacturing Dana TE Series transmissions. Other than Dana’s European manufacturing facility, this leading drivetrain for mining machinery can now only be repaired and remanufactured at selected Sandvik powertrain centres. The Lively facility now caters for customers in North and South America.

Following a major refurbishment, the centre now boasts the necessary electrical upgrades to support a host of newly acquired equipment, including a purpose-built test bench for the TE50 and a rotator chair, and has been fitted out with new racking and special tooling for the transmission. In addition, once Sandvik trucks in Europe and Africa begin to require TE50 transmission repair and remanufacture, technicians from those service centres will undergo the necessary training in Lively.

The rebuilt transmission undergoes a comprehensive evaluation on the new test bench. Simulating real-world operating conditions, this involves checking the sequencing of speed selection, clutch pressures, clutch functionality, oil temperature and variable rpm under load simulation, ensuring that productivity is maximized once the transmission is refitted into the vehicle.

“When a transmission arrives in the workshop, we disassemble it, digitally capture and catalogue every step in the service process, before generating a failure report and sending it along with a quote to the customer,” explains workshop manager Mandy Gibbons. “If it's an exchange transmission, the customer will purchase another transmission from their local sales areas inventory, return their core, which is sent to us, repaired, and returned back to the sales area to re-enter the exchange program.

“But apart from the exchange program, we offer other commercial options as well – if they prefer to keep their original transmission, it can be sent to Lively for repair and return.

“Lively was Sandvik Canada’s first powertrain centre, we've always repaired transmissions here – just on a much smaller scale,” Gibbons concludes. “However, the TE50 is very, very large, and more complex; we just didn’t have the tooling, test bench or training to accommodate it until now. Ever since we achieved certification, all but one of the transmissions we’ve handled has been a TE50, so we’re definitely meeting a major market need. They may take a bit longer to turn around, but we’ve always taken pride in what we do here and can still guarantee that whatever we’re shipping out has been rebuilt precisely to OEM specifications.”

More information is available at Sandvik Mining and Rock Solutions.