Driving down element turnaround time whereas improving quality and lowering 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 progressive improvement allows the company to supply extra elements at a time – and more rapidly. This will help in assembly rising customer demand, while additionally lowering rework and wastage.
“As a half of our Project Vuka, this new plant allows us to solid a number of small components per batch somewhat than simply one at a time,” says Smith. “We can even cut back our knock-out occasions from days to just a few hours.”
The state-of-the-art facilities enable Weir Minerals Africa to solid excessive chrome elements weighing up to 250 kg. There are เกจวัดแรงดันลมดิจิตอล to the new process, he explains, which uses polystyrene to create moulds. The first phase is the polystyrene moulding process, which happens after the polystyrene beads have been expanded. The second part is the place the ramming, pouring and demoulding takes place.
In contrast to the standard moulding line – where resin and catalyst are used to bind sand – the Replicast Plant makes use of silica sand of 30-35 AFS grade along 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 – in addition to having no clamping process – ends in much less scrap being produced, and subsequently brings operational savings,” he says. “The quality of castings can be raised, with a greater floor finish and fewer defects.”
He notes that the geometrical stability of elements is improved, as there may be much less fettling of the finished product thereby reducing dimensional variation between the same elements. This in flip contributes to the reliability of the tools using these elements. He says the foundry may even realise vital environmental advantages on account of using no chemical compounds within the sand.
“This new plant aligns well with our corporate sustainability goals, making certain that our processes aren’t solely compliant however continuously reduce our environmental influence,” says Smith. “Our new moulding systems 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 expertise is also leading to less frequent disposal of silica sand, and the sand itself is more environmentally pleasant because it accommodates no resin or acid.
“A exceptional facet of creating this new plant was the truth that it was accomplished with our native abilities and largely through the COVID-19 lockdowns,” he says. “Despite the novelty of this expertise, and the logistical challenges created by the pandemic, it was successfully carried out on time and within price range.”
The plant contains greater than 16,000 individual parts, and makes use of over 1,900 m of cabling, 300 m of water piping and fifty five tons of steel.
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