Fortis Mining, Engineering, and Manufacturing has the full capabilities to refurbish old equipment, trucks, trailers, steel and concrete. Recently Fortis refurbished bail and pods for PCS Cory. This included sand blasting and painting, replacing some structural steel, and machining new parts. This was all accomplished within 10 days.

At Fortis we have really come to respect how much quality affects safety. 

Our Quality Assurance Coordinator, Ken Ross states, "At Fortis we clearly understand the correlation between quality of product and safety. If you aren’t in control of the quality of your product, you can potentially (even though unintentionally) cause injury or death to others. We’ve all seen examples of this in the auto industry when defects such as wiring issues caused fire, tires blew out and accelerators stuck causing several injuries and deaths."

Fortis understands one of the keys to success is getting employees to “buy in” on the shop floor. One of the ways to get that “buy in” is to educate your work force to ensure they understand what can happen when we deviate from the quality control processes that we have in place. If you have any kind of a quality control system in place, you know how important it is to: question something that doesn’t look right, document any issues (even if they are small), communicate between steps, take the time to double check or have someone verify your work, sign off the appropriate steps, have qualified person check along the way, etc.

Our philosophy has been “Think of the news article”. When disaster strikes the news reports are often cruel and misleading, reporters don’t worry about the small details of what really happened or whose reputation they are destroying. It’s bad enough that someone was injured or killed, now the ripple effect starts. If you consider the news article approach, you are more apt to take the time to double check and be very particular as to what you are checking and signing off.

We coach people only to sign quality control steps that they agree with, to add comments, to seek further explanation and bring issues to their Supervisor’s attention. For example, a welder finishes the last welds on a unit before it goes on to the next step in the process, he or she didn’t complete the welds on top of the unit and doesn’t like the look of them, the welder should sign “I didn’t complete these first welds on the top of this unit, I question whether or not they meet our standards. Please have our Welding Inspector and/or Supervisor re-check them and sign off.” If the welds were up to our standard, then we coach the welder as to how to meet them and (most importantly) thank them for raising the concern. If they weren’t up to standard this person may have potentially saved the lives of people, saved our reputation and kept us out of a news article.

Recap:  

• Quality will affect safety
• Get control of the quality checks on the shop floor
• Educate your workforce -Don’t sign off on a step that you aren’t happy with, ask questions, write comments, and/or ask for a second opinion, etc.
• Think of the news article approach.

Fortis’ metal fabrication shop has completed manufacturing a huge custom order of conveyor frames.  Fortis described the challenge the project presented to our client, and our plan for completing the project on time and on budget.  Fortis provided regular progress reports to the customer throughout the manufacturing process.  Now, Fortis has completed the order and the graph below shows the detailed progression of our metal fabrication process...

Fortis used Earned Value Reporting to track progress on a regular basis.  Manufacturing hurdles did occur as we progressed through the fabrication process.  However, we were able to see the problems as they occurred and corrected the issues.  We met our delivery requirements which resulted in Fortis completing this equipment manufacturing project on time and on budget.  Fortis is fast becoming one of Saskatchewan's premier original equipment manufacturer shops.

Fortis Mining, Engineering, and Manufacturing has the capability to fulfill all your Industrial construction and mining needs.  We have a fully certified CWB weld shop located in Saskatoon.  From engineering, to welding, to machining, to install, Fortis can complete all your project requirements. Fortis’ ISO certifications in quality, environment, and safety make us a perfect fit to satisfy all your custom manufacturing and OEM needs.  No job is too complex or too small for our welding shop, Fortis will work through them all.

Please visit www.fortiscorporation.com for a full company profile and please feel free to email info@fortiscorporation.com or call 306-242-4427 to contact Fortis to see how we can help you with your next project.

This year, Fortis Mining Engineering and Manufacturing had the distinction of being selected by the Saskatchewan Industrial and Mine Suppliers Association for a case study on one of our pieces of mining equipment, the Mobile Reel Handler.   This study was also done in conjunction with the Government of Saskatchewan.  Only a handful of companies within Saskatchewan were selected and Fortis had the distinction of being one of those companies.   To be considered, your company must have engineered and manufactured a unique and new piece of equipment for the mining or industrial industry in Saskatchewan.   The Mobile Reel Handler was put on a long list of possible case studies.  Eventually after some research and comparisons by SIMSA, it was decided that the Mobile Reel Handler was indeed an innovative piece of mining equipment and well worth a case study!

Recently SIMSA published the case study and sent out to SIMSA members, government officials and will be handed out at varying SIMSA events.

You can read the case study on SIMSA's website https://simsa.ca/member/wp-content/uploads/SIMSA_Fortis_Casestudy_LR.pdf or see the attached pdf below

SIMSA_Fortis_Casestudy_LR.PDF (779.6KB)

The Mobile Reel Handler is currently being used at the Potash Corp. Rocanvile West Expansion product.

Peruse our website to see additional examples of Fortis engineering, CNC machining, welding and fabrication.

In addition to engineering and manufacturing, the Fortis Mining division is a well respected mining contractor and mining subcontractor in Canada.  The Fortis Mining division has successfully completed a number of difficult projects in local potash mines that our competition was unwilling to tackle.  Fortis has worked for the major mine companies, including Potash Corp, Agrium, BHP Billiton and Cameco.   Visit our mining projects page to see some of the projects we have completed http://www.fortiscorporation.com/projects-mining.aspx

Fortis is proudly Saskatoon, Saskatchewan owned and operated.

A few weeks ago we talked about how our fabrication shop is manufacturing a huge order of conveyor frames.  Fortis managed to take control of the manufacturing side of the order, but how do we handle keeping our customer aware of where all the frames are?

Fortis is a multi-faceted organization with specialties ranging from manufacturing, to engineering, to project management, and site install when required.  Fortis used all of these areas to bring together reporting metrics so our customer easily sees how the project is advancing at any stage of the project. 

Fortis uses Earned Value Reporting to track progress and to provide updates to our customers.  In the graphs below, Fortis uses this reporting method to establish trend lines showing how the brackets are progressing at weekly intervals.  Our customer can see the status at a glance and can look at the detailed report as required.

There are three different types of frames required.  Fortis tracks the progress on each frame and the whole order as a total.  This allows Fortis to share with our customer the short falls and gains on an ongoing basis.   This reporting eliminates surprises and allows Fortis to adjust the schedule and resources accordingly in order to ensure overall customer satisfaction.

As the frames are completed; labeling is attached as per our Clients requirements.  Information including frame type, laydown areas (surface/underground), contact information, are just a few items we can include on the label.  Fortis’ labels are waterproof to ensure the information won’t smudge or disappear when exposed to wet environments.

Fortis Mining, Engineering, and Manufacturing has the capability to fulfill all your Industrial needs.  From engineering, to welding, to machining, to install, Fortis can complete all your project requirements.  No job is too complex or too small, Fortis will work through them all.

Please visit www.fortiscorporation.com for a full company profile and please feel free to email info@fortiscorporation.com or call 306-242-4427 to contact Fortis to see how we can help you with your next project.

Fortis Mining Engineering and Manufacturing is proudly Saskatoon, Saskatchewan owned and operated.