Capital Equipment News August 2017

MATERIALS PROCESSING NEWS

Redefining aggregates production Rather than sourcing expensive sand and aggregates on building sites, a start-up company on the West Rand, Gauteng, South Africa, has begun a ground breaking new operation that turns spoils and site rubble into valuable building materials for re-use on site. The aptly named Ground Breakers operation makes use of a portable scalping and screening machine to separate excavated materials into different sizes or streams such as building sand, building stone, fill, bedding or a range of different sized aggregates as specified by an engineer. Rather than excavate a site and pay for spoils to be dumped, the dynamic duo of JC Janse van Vuuren and Johan Meintjes have turned this traditional method around and are successfully marketing the concept of processing the spoils on site. In addition to saving on dumping costs, builders have the added benefit of reusing the materials on site and reducing the need for additional aggregates to be procured. “The newly available Powerscreen Warrior 800 scalping screen from ELB Equipment is easily transportable and can begin operation in hours of delivery. The aggressive nature of the screening process allows large quantities of materials to be processed quickly and the addition of a scalping deck ensures that oversized rocks, rebar or mesh from the building site are seamlessly separated without impacting Stilfontein-based sand and aggregate supplier CNC Crushers raised throughput at its Roadstone Shaft 5 crushing plant by 45% while cutting back on maintenance and simultaneously increasing production, after implementing a full process-focused solution from Weir Minerals Africa. According to JD Singleton, Weir Minerals GM for Trio and Enduron equipment, the customer was experiencing high wear on the installed conventional cyclone, as well as on the older technology pump, having to replace liners every 120 hours of operation. “Our brief was to increase solids to the cyclone underflow and increase the wear life on the cyclone feed pump,” says Singleton. “The continuous breakdowns experienced with the older-technology crushing equipment, and the excessive oil usage was also causing high downtime for the plant. CNC Crushers needed a solution that would utilise the existing footprint and infrastructure.” As a solution, Weir Minerals Africa installed a new technology Warman WBH

The Powerscreen Warrior 800 scalping screen is performing beyond Ground Breakers’ expectations.

production,” says Van Vuuren. Partner and technical expert, Meintjes explains that once the concept of the business was finalised, the process of selecting the right machine was a long one. The focus shifted from the original plan of using second-hand machines, after studies had showed that actual running costs of a new, supported machine would be roughly on par with the new one. In addition, the added flexibility of the new type of machine was preferable as it opened new avenues of business being easy-to-transport machine,

scalping capabilities. “We have long-term goals and needed a machine that can last as long as these plans and adapt to our changing requirements. The Warrior 800 gives us versatility to operate in a quarry on a 24/7 basis and build up stockpiles and later get transported to a construction site to process other materials. On site, it is easy to set up and operate with hydraulic folding tail and side conveyors, rigid feed hopper sides and two speed tracks that can be used to separate up to three streams and stockpile them. b

Weir’s process-focused solution ups CNC Crushers’ output

100 slurry pump and a Cavex 400CVX10 hydrocyclone; it also replaced the existing cone crushers with Trio TC51S and TC36SH cone crushers to increase uptime and reduce maintenance costs. “After 1 900 operating hours, the slurry pump was still running without needing any

laminar spiral inlet geometry. “The Cavex hydrocyclone increased the mass pull to the underflow, which resulted in increased production and reduced slimes to the tailings dam,” he says. “Using new technology equipment pays.” b

replacement parts, a vast improvement on the pre- vious mean time between liner replacements of 120 hours,” he says. According to CNC owner Carl Crous, this meant that the company could take pumps off the critical maintenance list. “Pump problems are something of the past,” says Crous. With regard to the hydrocyclones, these proved to be more efficient than the conventional cyclones, highlighting the benefits of the Cavex hydrocyclone’s

CNC Crushers’ owner, Carl Crous next to a Cavex 400CVX10 hydrocyclone.

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