Cat Deploys First Self-Driving 777 Dump Truck for Aggregates Industry (Video)

Caterpillar continues its advancements in autonomous haul trucks, revealing its first deployment of the technology for the aggregates industry.

Luck Stone’s Bull Run Plant in Chantilly, Virginia, becomes the first to run the self-driving Cat 777 rigid-frame dump truck equipped with MineStar Command, Caterpillar’s autonomous system.

The video below shows the autonomous 777 in action:

Luck Stone is the largest family-owned and -operated producer of crushed stone, sand and gravel in the U.S. and has been working with Caterpillar for the past two years to expand the autonomous truck fleet and come up with an economically viable solution for the market.

The 777 has a 101-ton payload and runs on a 1,025-gross-horsepower Cat engine. Cat MineStar Command uses light-detection and ranging (LiDAR), a laser-based imaging system to avoid obstacles and stay on course. The system fires lasers at over 1 million times per second. This creates a detailed point cloud that shows where the truck encountered solid objects, according to Caterpillar.

“The device’s cylinder rotates at 600 rpm, offering wide coverage of the truck’s path to ensure that nothing enters the area without the truck detecting it in time to respond appropriately,” Caterpillar says. “This could mean slowing down, stopping, honking the horn or any other action necessary to avoid a hazardous situation.”

Caterpillar has been developing autonomous haul trucks for decades. From 1994 to 1995, it ran the first two prototype Cat 777C autonomous mining trucks at a Texas limestone quarry, hauling more than 5,000 production loads over a 2.6-mile course. Since then, the company’s autonomous haulers are used on three continents and have moved more than 8.6 billion metric tons.

Cat MineStar Command was launched commercially in 2013. Other trucks that have been equipped with the autonomous system include the Cat 789D (the industry’s first fully automated water truck), the Cat 793F, the 794 AC and the 797F – ranging in payload from 213 to 400 tons.

“Congratulations to both the Luck Stone and Caterpillar teams for this outstanding achievement,” said Denise Johnson, group president of Caterpillar’s Resource Industries, of the autonomous Cat 777 deployment. “It’s meaningful not just for Bull Run operations, but for our customers of all sizes as we develop new technologies to serve the quarry and aggregates as well as construction industries.

“This hands-on collaboration has accelerated our ability to scale our proven mining solution for this sector.” 

“The successful implementation of an autonomous hauling solution at our Bull Run Plant is a major accomplishment for Luck Stone associates, for Caterpillar and for our industry,” said Charlie Luck, chairman and CEO of Luck Companies. “Our mission is to ignite human potential and positively impact the lives of others, and this project does just that by providing opportunities and experiences for our associates to grow and learn. Caterpillar’s innovative technology will also improve safety and be a tool for attracting the next generation of mining professionals.”

To watch a more extensive demonstration of Cat’s self-driving haul trucks, check out this video: