Many of the stacking and reclaiming machines employed in the mining industry today are operating in ways that were never envisaged in the days before they were commissioned, with greater throughput, increased annualised operating hours and load cycles well in excess of their original specification requirements being the norm. In many cases these machines were supplied prior to the widespread use of finite element modelling or, in the era when such software became commercially available, those supplied designed using simplified and/or coarser meshes than would be employed today._x000D_
With many of these machines being expected to operate for many years to come, it is important that their ongoing reliability be maintained and their operational limits understood._x000D_
In this paper, a case study is used to outline the method required for estimating the fatigue life already consumed and the likely real life left in a machine. By reference to the machine's prior operating history, the use of strain gauges in the field and the development of finely meshed finite element analysis (FEA), a coherent picture of the machine's operational state can be generated and then investment/maintenance decisions made to ensure continuity of machine operation.