Modern Quarrying April-May 2016

SAND PROCESSING AT THE QUARRY FACE

done anything too differently. We’ve just kept our eyes on the water flows but oth- erwise, it’s taken care of itself, we have not had an ounce of problems. “The biggest benefit,” he continues, “is that we won’t have to clean up our clay deposits as often now because we won’t be putting as much out there. Maybe we can get the cleanouts out to six months and reduce them further from there. That has certainly been one major improvement.” Murphy says the feedback from Mawsons has also been encouraging for MWS. “The feedback from Mawsons has been very positive and they are par- ticularly impressed with the ease and speed of relocation between sites, and the re-commissioning of the wash plant. The results from testing of samples that were processed have indicated a higher

for example dredging operations. The Finesmaster Super Fines enables clas- sification at approximately 40 microns for fine sand applications. Each of these varieties of the Finesmaster range offer throughputs ranging from 20 to 200 tph. We can match a machine with a custom- er’s specific requirements, thus keeping capital expenditure and running costs down.” Cautious optimism The feedback from Mawsons about the performance of the combined mobile wash plant at Whorouly is cautiously positive, given that the M1700 and the FM120C has only been in operation for a short time. “I must say I’m impressed on the results we’ve had so far,” Gilbert con- cedes.“It’s just been so trouble-free; we’ve put the plant to work and we haven’t

retention of fine sands than previously achieved which backs up the theory of the cyclone system. With the addition of a fines conveyor for the M1700, they are happy with the versatility this machine brings to their mobile fleet. “From the outset, Mawsons have wanted a system that will produce con- sistently clean sand and aggregates while retaining as much bottom end fines as possible. The second requirement was that it would be flexible enough to be re-located between sites with minimal set-up time. “Basically, at the end of the day, we wanted tonnage and to recover what sand is capable of being recovered for our concrete plants,” Gilbert sums up. “If you have to import fine sand, then that costs us money. If we can reduce those costs by even five per cent, then we’ve made sig- nificant savings.”

Mawsons’ Cat 950G wheel loader feeds the M1700 rinsing screen (centre), which in turn feeds the FM120C compact cyclone wash plant (right).

This article originally appeared in the December 2015 edition of Quarry. It reappears in MQ with kind permission.

The FM120C is a modular sand recovery unit on a single chassis that can clean up to two grades of sand, and can be employed for numerous organic and manufactured sand operations.

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MODERN QUARRYING

April - May 2016