One of the largest quarries in the state of Georgia, USA, Warren County, has implemented Orica's latest FRAGTrack™ Conveyor technology to produce optimal aggregate, reducing operational costs and increasing saleable product.

The site has faced challenges designing blasts that consistently produce aggregate close to the economically optimal band of ¾ inch to 2-inch. Without careful blast design, blasts produce too much oversize or fine material, resulting in high processing costs and increased waste. Therefore, it was crucial for Warren County to continuously improve blast designs to produce a size distribution that minimised downstream costs and increased saleable product.

To help resolve Warren County's concern, Orica proposed to have a FRAGTrack™ conveyor unit installed next to the primary crusher. The automated fragmentation measurement device, delivered as part of Orica's BlastIQ™ Digital Blast Optimisation Platform suite, captures real-time fragmentation measurement data for downstream unit productivity improvement and tracking of operational performance.

David Stewart, Senior Production Manager, Midsouth-Aggregates said: "The installation experience was effortless. The equipment arrived, we made the brackets and installed it easily. As a result, we have had significant uptime and it has been very low maintenance for our operation."

Acting as a critical piece of the puzzle, FRAGTrack™ helps to provide Warren County with rapid insights into the blasting outcome, enabling them to quickly evaluate and optimise their blast designs to maximise the amount of saleable product. Besides utilising the measurement data for optimisation, the data is also retained and transferred off as knowledge to upskill the team and ultimately the DNA of the operation.

"Every ton of rock which goes through comminution adds cost and generates waste. Every 1% reduction in fines I can achieve will generate an extra $250,000 to my operation; it's a multi-million-dollar opportunity that goes straight to my bottom line. With FRAGTrack, I can see how my blast designs change this and it allows me to maximise whatever finished product I can deliver"

To read the whole customer testimonial from Warren County, please download it here.

FRAGTrack™ installed next to the primary crusher

 

 

Warren County in Georgia, USA