Driving down component turnaround time while bettering 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 revolutionary improvement allows the company to supply extra parts at a time – and extra rapidly. This will assist in assembly rising customer demand, while also lowering rework and wastage.
“As a half of our Project Vuka, this new plant permits us to solid multiple small components per batch somewhat than simply one at a time,” says Smith. “We also can reduce our knock-out occasions from days to simply a couple of hours.”
The state-of-the-art services enable Weir Minerals Africa to solid high chrome components weighing up to 250 kg. There are two phases to the model new process, he explains, which makes use of polystyrene to create moulds. The first part is the polystyrene moulding course of, which occurs after the polystyrene beads have been expanded. The second phase is where the ramming, pouring and demoulding takes place.
In เกจ์วัดแก๊สหุงต้ม to the traditional moulding line – the place resin and catalyst are used to bind sand – the Replicast Plant makes use of silica sand of 30-35 AFS grade together with the polystyrene mould, he says. The system includes a vacuum bin, from which all 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 due to this fact brings operational financial savings,” he says. “The high quality of castings is also raised, with a greater surface end and fewer defects.”
He notes that the geometrical stability of components is improved, as there is much less fettling of the finished product thereby decreasing dimensional variation between the same elements. This in flip contributes to the reliability of the equipment using these elements. He says the foundry may even realise important environmental advantages on account of using no chemical compounds within the sand.
“This new plant aligns well with our corporate sustainability objectives, making certain that our processes usually are not only compliant but continuously cut back our environmental influence,” says Smith. “Our new moulding techniques make positive that fewer gases are emitted during the casting course of, and there are zero emissions of dangerous substances such as benzene.”
The new technology is also resulting in less frequent disposal of silica sand, and the sand itself is more environmentally pleasant because it accommodates no resin or acid.
“A remarkable aspect of developing this new plant was the truth that it was done with our native abilities and largely through the COVID-19 lockdowns,” he says. “Despite เครื่องวัดแรงดันเกจที่นิยมใช้ of this technology, and the logistical challenges created by the pandemic, it was successfully carried out on time and within price range.”
The plant contains more than 16,000 individual elements, and uses over 1,900 m of cabling, 300 m of water piping and 55 tons of steel.
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