MechChem Africa January-February 2022

⎪ Water, wastewater and pumping solutions ⎪

solutions. By far the most economical way of dredging a silted up dam, for example, is to use geotextile bags or tubes,” explains Spagnuolo. “Since geotextile bags are consumable, this also enables the costs to be justified as an operational expense, as opposed to hav- ing to seek capex approval for an expensive machine,” she adds. “We have a number of different geotex- tile options in terms of filtration rates and strengths,” Prior continues. “Wherewe know the particles are relatively large, we can of- fer high-flow rate textile that enables the water to drain very quickly – and we have an onsite laboratory to test the solid retention and flowrate options for any slurry sample,” he notes. At theother extremeareultra-fines,which require a completely different weave to ad- equately retain the solids while still enabling dewatering. “Our smaller square bags used for recoveryare typicallymanufacturedusing this geotextile, which has a weave density of between 250 and 280 g/m 2 . ZebraTube’s geotextile weave patterns for dewatering are not widely known inter - nationally, but, with extensive experience in South Africa, Australia, Middle East and across Africa, the company has come to un- derstand how to solve a broad range of slurry dewatering problems. “Carien’s knowledgeof water and theadditional surface technologies that are needed, we believe, can compete with any of the imported products that some people believe to be superior,” notes Prior. “We are able to go to site and establish a customer’s exact needs,” he continues. “If, for example, a customer only has space for a 28.5 m geotextile we can manufacture that exact length so it can be delivered and placed on site quickly and easily, without the need to modify an imported standard length that is too long or too short. “We can easily adjust bag lengths or place additional anchor points so that boulders can be avoided or we can move the spout to best suit the outlet pipes of the pumps. None of this is possible if clients choose to use im- ported geotextile products,” adds Spagnuolo. Manufacturing: the local advantage “Because our entire manufacturing chain is local, we have the ability to respond to emergencies very quickly,” continues Prior. “In terms of delivering custom made dewa-

Each of the stitchers at the Carletonville facility of StitchWise can produce 2.5 km of seams per day.

tering solutions in an emergency, our lead times are shorter than any other geotextile manufacturer,” he asserts. “Plus , we have product ion capac- ity. Each of our stitchers can produce 2.5 km of seams per day and currently, 4.0-million m 2 of geotextile material goes through our Carletonville factory every year. When we get a call to make 10 000 bags in 10 days, we have an additional expansion facility and over 100 sewing machines to help deliver the order on time,” he informs MechChem Africa. Not only is it unnecessary for South African clients to look overseas for solutions, but ZebraTube’s export sales have more than doubled in the past year, proving that the company can deliver directly to over- seas plants – in Africa, the Middle East and Australia – in emergency timescales. “Even for the Australian market, our lead times are extremely short andwe offer a very high degree of flexibility. If we need to turn an export order around in three days, we can make it happen. The longest lead time is shipping and, in an emergency, we can fly the order to the client, which means that dewa- tering can often start within five or six days of an order being placed,” he says. Prior tells of a current order for a client in the Middle East: “Initially, this client was very keen on our customisation capabil - ity and came to us wanting to know exactly where and how our ZebraTube dewatering solutions were manufactured. For current orders, this client gives us five days to get the bags stitched, boxed, crated, palletised and

sent to OR Tambo International Airport for flying to site. The mere fact that this client is willing to bear the cost of flying our product out of South Africa proves that he sees our pricing as highly competitive compared to other global geotextile manufacturers,” he points out. Locally, ZebraTube operates its own fleet of trucks to rapidly service mining and wastewater facilities in South Africa. “When clients require a quick solution for a dewater - ing taskwith a small laydown area, we supply our geotextile bags, whichwe hold in stock to ensure we can respond rapidly. These bags are also used as an interim emergency solu- tion while we manufacture the dewatering tubes needed to complete the task. “Large tubes are almost always custom made to order in another of our facilities on this site,” he adds. Becausewe are flexible, we can adopt a fit-for-purpose approach, making sure that the solutions we put onto a site will meet the needs specified by our clients without being overdesigned or unnecessarily costly,” says Prior. WeareaSouthAfricanmanufacturingand employment success story. The geotextile material we used ismanufactured in Paarl by our partner company, Spilo, and we employ 145 people in Carletonville to custom stitch the geotextile bags. As well as servicing South Africa’s mining industry and mitigat- ing against environmental harm, ZebraTube products are nowalso being exported, which generates foreign revenue for our country,” Spagnuolo concludes. zebratube.co.za

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