Conveyor and blower system unloads positive results
A ready-mix concrete producer installs a semidense-phase conveyor and blower system to improve its production plant's railcar cement unloading operation.
R-Con Corp., a division of Ritchie Corp., Wichita, Kans., produces ready-mix concrete at four ready-mix plants in Wichita and two in the surrounding area. The company supplies concrete mixes for various federal, state, local, and residential construction projects throughout Kansas. Cement arrives at the plants in gravity-discharge hopper-bottom railcars and is unloaded and conveyed to onsite storage silos before being incorporated into the concrete mix and distributed by trucks to the various project sites. The company recently decided to improve one of the plant's railcar unloading operations to increase the material unloading rate, decrease production and maintenance costs, and reduce labor requirements. The company worked with a bulk material handling systems supplier to install a new semidensephase conveyor and blower system to unload the cement and convey it to the silos.