KS60 CBM Stabilisation plant supplied for N6 project in Galway, Ireland

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  • KS60 CBM Stabilisation plant supplied for N6 project in Galway, Ireland

21st October 2009 - BG Europa (UK) Ltd has supplied a model KS60 CBM/Stabilisation plant to FCC Construction of Spain to produce material for the N6 road construction project in Galway - Ireland.

The KS60 CBM/Stabilisation plant has a production capacity of up to 550 metric tph and will produce a total of 270,000 tons for the project.

Each of the four aggregate bins has a capacity of 30 tons and is fitted with a bolt on belt feeder with an output capacity of up to 200 tph.  Drive is provided directly to the head shaft by a Nord bevel helical gear unit providing high operating efficiency with high torque on start up. The feeders feature a hinged mounting design to allow the unit to be lowered to enable rapid endless belt replacement which ensures minimal downtime in the event of belt damage. The feeders each incorporate a single load cell weigh idler to accurately and independently control the aggregate feed rate. 

For the first time the aggregate feed unit was fitted with a Hydronix Hydro-Probe II moisture monitor to continually measure the aggregate moisture level during production. This enables the PLC controls to modulate the mixer water addition to achieve a constant moisture level in the mixed material.

Both the aggregate gathering conveyor and inclined conveyor are fitted with Nord bevel helical gear units giving around 95% efficiency in drive transmission which is far in excess of the 50% efficiency associated with the worm type boxes used by some competitors.

The twin shaft mixer is 2.40m in length and features 64 reversible and replaceable cast NI-HARD paddle tips mounted on split type SG iron paddle arms for long life. The drive is provided by a 75.0 kW electric motor and features a powder coupling V-belt drive to reduce power requirements on start up and provide protection to the gear units.

The addition of fine material, in this case OPC,  is controlled by the two model 809 loss in weight fines feeders, each mounted from four load cells within the fines silo support structures. The individual weigh pods are fitted with variable speed vane feeders providing a capacity of up to 40 tph, with accurate adjustment independent of load changes. The fine feeds are controlled by the microprocessor, which measures the loss in weight of the hopper and adjusts the fines feed rate to production rate accordingly.

When the weigh pod is nearly empty the processor freezes the feed rate and opens a butterfly valve to allow rapid recharge of the pod from a 125m³ WAM bolted construction bulk silo. The loss in weight method of fines addition ensures accuracy and assured control of the dosing of the often high value fine material. 

The PLC compensating continuous blend controller is configured to allow the control language to be switched between English and Spanish. Thus ensuring both local and relocating FCC operators can be immediately familiar with the control system. The system is designed to be robust to operate within the environment of a transient work site. The colour LCD display and numeric keypad allow production to be controlled and monitored while material utilisation and production records are held within a 100 batch memory. A connection point allows a laptop to be utilised to download records in an Excel compatible format.

As with all KS units produced by BG Europa the entire plant was built up within the workshop and tested before shipping to site. This attention provides assurance that the plant will easily fit together during site erection to meet production requirements. It also allows customers to inspect the plant prior to taking delivery.

Following testing the plant is broken down into large scale items each designed to be efficiently and cost effectively transported on either road trailers or containerised depending on destination. For this project an installation engineer accompanied the plant upon delivery to Galway to supervise plant erection, which was undertaken over a five day period.

The KS60 is due to remain on the N6 project until November 2009.