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Monier Lifetile picks the Wright System.
19th May 2004

Wright Brothers Industrial Services have just completed a major project for Monier Lifetile Inc at their facility at Lake Wales, Florida, USA.

Primarily involved in concrete roof tile manufacture Monier Lifetile chose Worksop based company to completely modernise the existing plant and supply new aggregate storage and raw material feed conveyor systems for the three production lines of grey cement, pulverised fly ash and white cement. Modifications were also required to the existing sand feed system, this included a new sand screen and raw material feed conveyors being supplied.

Working closely with Monier's management team Wright Brothers developed a specification and plant layout which not only provided accurate raw material mixing, but also reduced maintenance and down-time.

Careful planning was required as the new equipment had to be installed within a critical short plant shutdown of two weeks.

For such a major task to be successful Wright Brothers manufactured, then trial assembled at their own factory before shipping to Florida for the installation within the agreed period.

Removing the existing feed systems for both the grey and white cement, a 290 ton (grey) and 200 ton (white) capacity silos were installed, each fitted with a new cone and bin activator complete with an isolating valve to enable maintenance on the screw conveyor delivery systems to be performed without the need to empty the silo. Each silo was also fitted with a fill pipe, load cell type capacity indication level alarms and suitable access platforms.

A single screw conveyor fitted with anti-wear flights feeding cement into 7 ton hoppers was also supplied. These hoppers have three outlets which are fitted with 10" sliding gate type shut-off valves. Additionally, new 8"rotary valves with a rating of 7.23 tph were fitted to each outlet from the holding hoppers. Each of these rotary valves was fitted with a deflection flow meter allowing accurate determination of the material flow. The outlet from the flow meters is directed onto the raw material feed conveyors via a chute, thus minimising any dust generation.

Removing the existing feed system for the pulverised fly ash production line also required the installation of a 150 ton capacity silo which was fitted to the same specification as the grey/white cement silos; this also utilised a similar anti-wear screw conveyor and deflection flow meter which accurately determines the pulverised fly ash flow to the grey cement screw conveyor.

Modification was also made to the existing aggregate delivery conveyor to incorporate a new enclosed sand screen which was installed 123 ft from the tail end of the conveyor this conveyor required a new 10 hp torque arm type unit driving a 20" diameter lagged drive drum with a 12" diameter snub. The tail-end was fitted with a 16" diameter tensioning tail drum. This conveyor fitted with a chute and scrapers, delivers sand to the screen decking. For protection against adverse weather this conveyor was fitted with covers on the above ground portion.

To incorporate a new screen at this point in the system Wright Brothers modified the main truck dump hopper. This 30 ton capacity dump hopper is 14' 0" square in plan and was made suitable to be supported off concrete walls. The hopper was fitted with grizzly bars suitable for lorry loading via a concrete ramp as well as a cut-off gate at the discharge to enable maintenance to be carried out to the vibrating feeder if required.

At the discharge of the hopper a vibrating feeder controls a feed rate of 150tph, material passing onto a 24" wide, 85' 0" inclined centres troughed belt conveyor which transfers material onto a vibrating screen.
The new 8'x 4' vibrating single-deck screen is also rated at a 150tph and is fitted with an oversize reject shute. The material from this screen feeds onto a 24" wide, 22' 0" horizontal troughed belt conveyor to the existing grizzly hopper.

The screened sand is then fed to the existing sand holding hopper by the existing conveyor system. The sand holding hopper was fitted with a new bottom section and then incorporated into the existing building and fully enclosed from the elements with profiled steel cladding.

Wright Brothers also supplied and installed new dedicated raw material feed conveyors. Fitted with 20" wide belt the conveyors are driven by a 10hp torque arm type drive unit.

The whole project was completed within budget and most importantly within the agreed shutdown period.

Mick Smith, Project Engineer commented "The amount of work achieved in three short weeks is truly amazing; we were very nervous on the timescales due to inventory levels but I am convinced that the fact we were back in production on the planned day is wholly due to the professionalism, skill and flexibility of the installation and commissioning crew. The success of this project was only achieved by careful detailed planning and highly efficient project management by Wright Brothers Industrial Services."