1. Above: The Warman®
AH®
slurry pump.
Right: Newbold Quarry
Aggregate Industries
Newbold Quarry, UK
Case study
Minerals
Introduction
Weir Minerals Warman®
centrifugal
slurry pumps are important for the
heavy duty extraction processes at
mineral and sand quarries across the
globe.
Operating efficiency is key to the
success of any business, and Warman®
slurry pumps are working hard for
Aggregate Industries, one of the UK’s
major producers of heavy building
materials for the construction industry.
Background
Aggregate Industries quarries,
manufactures and supplies aggregates,
asphalts, concretes and derivative
products for use in a wide range of
sectors, including highways, housing
and rail. With its headquarters in the UK,
the company is part of the largest
construction materials company in the
world, LafargeHolcim.
Weir Minerals has supported Aggregate
Industries since 1993. Weir Minerals
supplies and services the heavy duty
slurry pumps that are the cornerstone of
the extraction processes at some of the
650 UK quarries and plants operated by
the company.
Newbold Quarry in Staffordshire was
opened in the 1960s. In 1997, it was
producing 600,000 tonnes of sand and
gravel per year, used to make pre-cast
and ready mix concrete.
The site has expanded and production
volumes have significantly increased.
Today, the quarry produces 818,000
tonnes of sand and gravel annually.
The challenge
The production process is relatively
complex, delivering gravels in 20mm,
10mm and 6mm, as well as concrete and
building sands. The plant operated with
one single light duty pump, working on
low production volumes.
In 2008, the business installed one of
Europe’s largest sand processing plants,
boosting production from 2,500 tonnes
per day to 4,500 tonnes per day.
To support the increase in production,
significantly improving process
efficiency was paramount.
The solution
The new sand processing plant utilises
eight Warman®
pumps for slurry
transfer. These pumps are:
2 x Warman®
10/8 EM
1 x Warman®
8/6 EAH
1 x Warman®
12/10 EM
Warman®
slurry pumps deliver significant
production increases at Newbold Quarry
INDUSTRY
Aggregates
customer
Aggregate Industries,
Newbold Quarry,
Staffordshire, England
equipment
Warman®
AH®
and
Warman®
M®
slurry pumps
2. 1 x Warman®
200 PFPC
1 x Warman®
200 DMU
1 x Warman®
150 CMU
1 x Warman®
40 PVSP
The combination of these heavy duty pumps and a comprehensive service and
maintenance agreement between
Weir Minerals Europe and Aggregate Industries means that since 2008, when the new
plant was built, downtime has been minimised.
The service agreement allows Weir Minerals to maintain the pumps on site, including
frequent condition-monitoring checks to maintain the efficiencies of the pumps.
The results
Since the installation of the Warman®
slurry pumps, downtime has been kept to a
minimum.
• Fixed costs: the Weir Minerals Europe fixed cost per month service agreement gives
Aggregate Industries peace of mind and cost control, removing ‘dips’ in operational
profitability.
• Strategic stock on site: labour and parts are included in the service agreement, and
spare Warman®
parts are stocked on site at Newbold Quarry, further cutting
maintenance and repair time.
Carmella Barbour, Site Manager at Newbold:
“The Warman®
slurry pumps carry out a wide range of operations across the plant,
from handling the slurry transfer of 6mm grit to fine building sands and clean water
for the screen spray bars.
“Because our process is relatively
complex, reliability of the units and rapid response servicing whenever an issue
arises is critical.
“The service team at Weir Minerals has worked closely with us for a number of years
to hone the on-site proactive
maintenance programme and this has proved highly effective, especially in ensuring
full-time availability of the wear parts we need.”
Warman®
10/8EM WP41172 operating information
Operating date range 08/01/2008-08/01/2015
Operating days
240 days per year (plant runs 5 days per week minus
4 weeks for holiday period and maintenance)
Average operating hours per
day
10
Estimated hours of operation
14,400 hours (based on running since 2008. 6 years x
240 days pumps run x 10 hours running per day.)
Parameter Value Units
Flow rate slurry (average) 777 m3/h
Discharge pressure (average) 33 M Head
Dry solids S.G (advised) 2.65 T/M³
Max particle size (advised) 6 mm
Mixture S.G (advised) 1.19 T/M³
Top: Newbold Quarry Sand and Gravel
processing plant which process’ nearly one
million tonnes per year.
Bottom: A Weir Minerals service engineer
carrying out condition monitoring on one of
the primary pumps.