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Panzers: I break rocks thread

Got all the 3” concrete all hailed out and sold. First big sale of the show material. :lmao: $4000 in that pile.

Found a pile measuring app for the iPhone. I tried it out today. Works pretty slick. Basically you just take a video of the pile by walking around it and it calculates the volume. If you place 2 cones out front 25’ apart the accuracy get to less than 2%.

I measured the screened sand pile we made at the show. Belt scale had 7700 ton on it. We made 4-500 before I put the belt scale conveyor in. Dad pulled 150-200 ton off of it.

Here is the model it made from my walk around.


IMG_9817.png


5700 yards at 1.4 tons/ yard is 7980 ton. Crazy how close that is. Especially with just a video walk around.

Some more I did today. Needed to verify these loader stacked piles. Boys were just counting buckets.

IMG_9820.png
IMG_9821.png


Only hard part is you need to get far enough back to capture the top and toe of the pile in the video as you are walking around.

IMG_9819.png


You can see where I had to walk up another pile to get far enough back.

Lastly I wanted to try a really odd shaped pile. This is the 3” breaker stone we made at the show. Contractor needed 1900 yds so we’ll see how close it is.

IMG_9822.png


I’m happy, unsure if I’ll subscribe or not. They give you a 7 day trial. . After that it is 100 a month.
 
ThePanzerFuhrer said:
Got all the 3” concrete all hailed out and sold. First big sale of the show material. :lmao: $4000 in that pile.

Found a pile measuring app for the iPhone. I tried it out today. Works pretty slick. Basically you just take a video of the pile by walking around it and it calculates the volume. If you place 2 cones out front 25’ apart the accuracy get to less than 2%.

I measured the screened sand pile we made at the show. Belt scale had 7700 ton on it. We made 4-500 before I put the belt scale conveyor in. Dad pulled 150-200 ton off of it.

Here is the model it made from my walk around.


IMG_9817.png


5700 yards at 1.4 tons/ yard is 7980 ton. Crazy how close that is. Especially with just a video walk around.

Some more I did today. Needed to verify these loader stacked piles. Boys were just counting buckets.

IMG_9820.png
IMG_9821.png


Only hard part is you need to get far enough back to capture the top and toe of the pile in the video as you are walking around.

IMG_9819.png


You can see where I had to walk up another pile to get far enough back.

Lastly I wanted to try a really odd shaped pile. This is the 3” breaker stone we made at the show. Contractor needed 1900 yds so we’ll see how close it is.

IMG_9822.png


I’m happy, unsure if I’ll subscribe or not. They give you a 7 day trial. . After that it is 100 a month.
Click to expand...
My manager got them to get a drone that he flies over to measure piles. And make videos of jobs and stuff.
 
We had a newer loader that kept bucket count. Which was awesome:smokin: Until you moved some material, cleaned up the road or loaded a truck. Then it was back to " did I cancel that bucket or not?":laughing:
 
So talk to me like I am 5...

These mining spreads are totally different from ours, I assume because of the rock (limestone)

None of our spreads are portable, the crusher is on a ramp built in to the ground, excavator with hydraulic breaker ran from the crusher office.

Is this just a geography deal or just the difference in quarry size, assuming you have the quarries up there like ours as well?
 
CarterKraft said:
So talk to me like I am 5...

These mining spreads are totally different from ours, I assume because of the rock (limestone)

None of our spreads are portable, the crusher is on a ramp built in to the ground, excavator with hydraulic breaker ran from the crusher office.

Is this just a geography deal or just the difference in quarry size, assuming you have the quarries up there like ours as well?
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Nah it’s more of a size of pit/ volume of material sold deal. Big quarries you can do the whole cast in place crushers. The only issues with this style is the lack of flexibility and the ever need to haul the material up to the crusher. If I could sell a million or 2 tons out of one location a stationary plant with a mobile jaw hooked to a mobile conveyor train to get it up to the plant up top is the way to go.

We typically only do 50,000 or less per set once in a great while we do a 100,000k set. So it’s a quick come in crush what you need then turn and burn to the next one. I have 6 gravel pits quarries of my own and a recycle yard. So it does not make sense to put in a stationary plant. Now if I had 500 acres in the middle of Chicago fuck yes I would. There is enough volume to keep the one plant busy all year round so it makes sense.

I move 15-20 times a year so portables it is. Then on top of that we have a short season 8-9 months so we need big huge portables so when we are crushing we are making piles.
 
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Talk to me like I’m less than 5. Are your six gravel pits far apart? Like they do not border each other. What would make a gravel pit be done? Is there some law you can only go so deep? Does the rock change as you get deeper? What do you do when it’s done? Let tax liens build up?
 
WaterH said:
Talk to me like I’m less than 5. Are your six gravel pits far apart? Like they do not border each other. What would make a gravel pit be done? Is there some law you can only go so deep? Does the rock change as you get deeper? What do you do when it’s done? Let tax liens build up?
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All my pits are within 5 miles of each other. A pits life is determined by the size/ depth of the deposit.

So 4 of my pits are what is called a glacial blowout. It’s what happens when the edge of the glacier stops and while it’s melting it creates a large lake behind the face. When the water undermines the face it blows out and creates a temporary river. This river concentrates the rock and washes the sand out. This creates a large fan pattern of good sand and gravel material. Our deposits are only 20-40’ deep of good Stoney material. Under that is fine sand or hard rock.

If the hard rock comes up high enough that it’s higher than the ground water you can drill and blast it. If the rock is lower than the ground water you cannot pump it dry as the water moves to well in the clean sand layer.

This is the 30 sec speil of how a pit works up by me. It boils down to the cost. Can you get enough money out of the material to recoup the costs that go into making the product. When the pumping costs too much, too much sand and no stone ect then the pit basically becomes used up. Can you sell what you are producing without having piles of stuff around you cannot sell in a timely manner. It’s kinda complex now that I’m trying to explain it.

It’s much easier if you standing next to me and I can show you what I’m taking about.
 
My quarries will be determined by the size and how fast the water comes in. The deeper you go the faster the waters comes in. Then you also need to plan for wall set backs every time you go deeper and how the ramp will go so you can get in and out of the hole.

So my big quarry has about 30 acres of un touched ground. If you can get 60’ feet out of it without too much trouble that is 2.8 million yards left in place. Each in place yard is like 1.5 tons of rock. That puts the reserve at 4,000,000 tons. Now I can only realistically sell 100,000 tons a year there so it has a life of 40 years left.
 
So this circles back to CarterKraft ‘s question. So this quarry has 4,000,000 tons of reserves in it. I can sell it for an average of $8/ton. Can I justify spending 5-6 million on a stationary plant to sell $800,000 a year in material. Instead I can spend 2 million on a portable spread that can do 450,000/tons a year in multiple pits.

The economics of where I’m at trends towards portable plants.
 
Thanks that all makes sense.

I get used to rock quarry equals 988+ size loader at the crusher 990+ size at the face and 775+ hauling so it seems like the only way to do it.

The season issue is a big one i'd imagine, something I had not considered at all.
 
Got an invite to go out to the case plant in June to operate their new loaders and give them feed back. Unsure if I’m gonna say yes or not. The pits would have to go on autopilot for the 3-3.5days I’m gone.

I forgot to tell the case bigwig when he was here for the demo days the return to dig blows and the bucket geometry needs work. I don’t know if they would like my feedback. :lmao:
 
They dont want your feedback. They just want to sell you shit:laughing:


Although if you do say anything bad, they will give you like 15 ballcaps. Least thats what the Komatzoo sales guy did. Then you get to have the fun conversation about how I dont wanna sit in your crappy loader, why in the hell would you think I want your name on my head:lmao::lmao: Then they just go ask somebody else.
 
Steve300xcw said:
They dont want your feedback. They just want to sell you shit:laughing:


Although if you do say anything bad, they will give you like 15 ballcaps. Least thats what the Komatzoo sales guy did. Then you get to have the fun conversation about how I dont wanna sit in your crappy loader, why in the hell would you think I want your name on my head:lmao::lmao: Then they just go ask somebody else.
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Nah this isn’t a sales pitch. They do that dog and pony show in their fancy ass proving grounds in tomahawk wi. I would never waste the time on that shit. Hell I have only been to the con expo once in my life and really have no interest in going back.

They said they would pay mileage hotel and meals. For the 3 days in Fargo. This would be a hang out with the engineers type deal.
 
ThePanzerFuhrer said:
They said they would pay mileage hotel and meals. For the 3 days in Fargo. This would be a hang out with the engineers type deal.
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Sounds to me like you also need to get compensation for your time unless you can spin this into a job in the winter or you’re getting something else out of it.

Positive me says sure that will be neat and informative for everyone. Negative side of me says everything will go asssideways as soon as I look away for 15 minutes.
 
Pocahontas said:
Sounds to me like you also need to get compensation for your time unless you can spin this into a job in the winter or you’re getting something else out of it.

Positive me says sure that will be neat and informative for everyone. Negative side of me says everything will go asssideways as soon as I look away for 15 minutes.
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That’s just it. It’s gonna go tits up as soon as I get out of the county :lmao:
 
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