Immersive Technologies has announced a new release of their dozer operator training technology for use with their Advanced Equipment Simulators including the PRO3.

This release includes extensive new training functionality and support for Caterpillar’s D11T track dozer.

Launched in November at the company’s 2011 Asia-Pacific User Group Forum in Queensland Australia, the new Caterpillar dozer simulator was enthusiastically received by the group consisting of over 45 mining professionals who had the opportunity to thoroughly test-drive the unit over the two day conference.

The mining group provided positive feedback on the dozer simulator’s visual and handling realism, together with its range of training capabilities.

ResCo’s Labour and Training Executive Group Manager, Darren Culley, had the opportunity to trial the Caterpillar D11T dozer simulator at the User Group Forum. Darren, an experienced surface mining operator and trainer said, “The realistic feel and exceptional depth perception of Immersive’s D11T simulator is very similar to the real machine.”

“I have no doubt that this training tool will revolutionise the way the mining industry trains people on dozers, especially for its ability to safely and efficiently replicate the tasks required to operate a dozer.”

Immersive Technologies’ simulated Caterpillar D11T dozer builds upon the company’s existing Caterpillar D11R dozer module which to date has been deployed to mining companies and contractors in 13 countries around the world since its launch in 2003.

Although new to the market, the Caterpillar D11T dozer equipment module has been met by strong demand with 15 orders already received.

This latest D11T dozer simulator combines working controls and instrumentation from the real machine, including the Advisor Monitoring System, which operates exactly the same as the system in the real machine.

Existing Immersive Technologies’ customers, already utilizing dozer simulator training, will also benefit from this leap forward in dozer training technology with many of the advanced new features being included as part of the company’s SimControl 4.2 software release, which is currently being distributed globally to service agreement holders.

Dozer enhancements in SimControl 4.2 include a task based operator assessment and reporting system, together with multiple on-screen training assistant tools designed to accelerate learning.

Immersive Technologies’ Product Portfolio Manager, Karen Joseph said, “This step forward in dozer training technology incorporates extensive feedback from our large mining customer base, together with expert technical knowledge from engineers at Caterpillar’s headquarters in Peoria, Illinoi. These two factors have proven critical to this and other developments of equipment simulators in order to ensure our products deliver results to our mining industry customers.”

Immersive Technologies’ exclusive technical alliance with Caterpillar sees the OEM (Original Equipment Manufacturer) provide proprietary machine technical information and engineering support to Immersive Technologies in the simulated development of CAT equipment.

The Caterpillar D11T dozer builds upon the company’s existing product portfolio which continues to be the largest developed and deployed population of advanced equipment simulators for surface and underground mining.