Driving down element turnaround time whereas enhancing quality and decreasing waste is being achieved at Weir Minerals Africa’s exciting new Replicast Plant in Isando, Gauteng.
Umar Smith, plant manager at Weir Minerals Africa’s Isando facility, highlights that the innovative growth enables the corporate to supply more elements at a time – and extra quickly. This will help in meeting growing buyer demand, while also decreasing rework and wastage.
“As part of our Project Vuka, this new plant allows us to solid multiple small components per batch rather than just separately,” says Smith. “We also can scale back our knock-out instances from days to only a few hours.”
ที่วัดแรงดัน -of-the-art facilities allow Weir Minerals Africa to solid high chrome components weighing up to 250 kg. There are two phases to the new course of, he explains, which makes use of polystyrene to create moulds. The first phase is the polystyrene moulding course of, which happens after the polystyrene beads have been expanded. The second part is where the ramming, pouring and demoulding takes place.
In distinction to the normal moulding line – the place resin and catalyst are used to bind sand – the Replicast Plant uses silica sand of 30-35 AFS grade together with the polystyrene mould, he says. The system entails a vacuum bin, from which all of the air is eliminated to compress the sand.
“The absence of resin and catalyst – as nicely as having no clamping process – ends in much less scrap being produced, and therefore brings operational financial savings,” he says. “The quality of castings is also raised, with a greater surface end and fewer defects.”
He notes that the geometrical stability of elements is improved, as there’s less fettling of the finished product thereby lowering dimensional variation between the same parts. This in flip contributes to the reliability of the gear using these elements. He says the foundry may also realise significant environmental advantages as a outcome of using no chemicals within the sand.
“This new plant aligns nicely with our corporate sustainability targets, guaranteeing that our processes aren’t solely compliant but continuously scale back our environmental influence,” says Smith. “Our new moulding methods ensure that fewer gases are emitted in the course of the casting course of, and there are zero emissions of harmful substances corresponding to benzene.”
The new know-how can additionally be resulting in much less frequent disposal of silica sand, and the sand itself is more environmentally pleasant as it accommodates no resin or acid.
“A remarkable facet of growing this new plant was the reality that it was accomplished with our native skills and largely during the COVID-19 lockdowns,” he says. “Despite the novelty of this expertise, and the logistical challenges created by the pandemic, it was successfully implemented on time and inside budget.”
The plant contains more than 16,000 individual components, and uses over 1,900 m of cabling, 300 m of water piping and fifty five tons of metal.
Share