VIDEO: Sand Valley Consults With Finkbiner On Wash Plant Design

Wed December 04, 2024
CEG; Finkbiner; Sand Valley

Sand Valley Sand and Gravel Inc. in Danville, Ill., produces material for the construction, asphalt and concrete industries, including concrete sand, asphalt sand, mason sand, coarse aggregates from 3/8" up to 7", as well as crushed products for the asphalt sector, including crushed chips and crushed sand.

CEG photo

James Scharf (L) and Clyde Robison in front of the Astec plant.

James Scharf and Joe Scharf, owners of Carri Scharf Materials Co., purchased Sand Valley in 2019. The company currently services an area within a 60- to 120-mi. radius of Danville, Ill., and includes western Indiana. Future expansion plans could include rail car deliveries to extend their service area. The site contains more than 50 million tons of reserves and an 8- to 10-acre lake, which the company plans to expand.

To make the site more efficient, the company needed some new equipment, and the Scharfs immediately spoke with Clyde Robison, vice president of sales, Finkbiner Equipment Company.

"We've known and been working with Clyde for 30 years," said James Scharf. "He's very, very knowledgeable when it comes to this industry, and that's why we always go to him."

After surveying the site and consulting with Scharf about what they needed, it was decided that a primary wash plant fed by a dredge would efficiently increase production. Also, a crushing plant for fractured products and a recycling plant to process recycled concrete and asphalt would be needed.

Robison recommended Astec, due to the various steps required for Sand Valley's processing. Astec provides a wide variety of crushing, screening, classifying, dewatering and conveying equipment that can be configured to meet desired specifications.

"We started building in June 2020 and erected the plant in about five months," said Scharf. "Then, we spent the winter building the dredge."

Equipment

The primary Astec plant, which is fed by the dredge, sorts the rock and sand via screens, a log washer, classifying tank and screws. This allows Sand Valley to produce its various products, including 1 ½", 1" x 3/4", 5/8", 3/8", FA1, mason sand and buckshot. The oversize rock — 1 ¾" by 7" — is used to feed the crushing plant to make 100 percent fractured sand and gravel products to serve the concrete/asphalt markets.

CEG photo

"The Astec wash plant has 8' by 20' Diester 3 deck screens on it — primary and secondary — with a 48" twin Astec log washer and a 12' by 48' Astec classifying tank," said Scharf. "The FA 1 dewatering screws are twin 66" Astecs; the mason sand screw is a 36" and the screw on our secondary to produce buckshot FM04 is a 44". All Rock products feed onto 80-ft. conveyor belts except for the sand, which utilizes 150' stackers that can stack 100,000 tons of concrete sand underneath a 180-degree radius."

The dredge is a Twinkle Co. L-Series 14" ladderpump dredge, designed for aggregate production. It is 127' by 3' and is all electric, 1,000 hp with a 14 by 14 Metso pump. It has a digging capability of 75' below water. There is a second 1,000 hp booster to help pump the material up to the plant.

"For the crushing spread, we have a Trio horizontal shaft impactor [four bar rotor] feeding a 5' by 14' Astec shaker deck and we're making 100 percent fractured sand, crushed 3/8" chips and the crushed 14s for the asphalt sector," said Scharf.

The recycling plant is an Eagle 1200 portable impactor plant with a 5' by 16' double deck.

"We make a CA6 roadpack with it and a 1" by 3" — those are recycled concrete products. When we recycle asphalt, we make strictly a CA6 grinding material," said Scharf.

How It Works

"The Astec plant is designed to handle a dredge feed, which pumps the material from the lake up to the top of the plant into a dewatering box with static screens to remove the excess water," said Robison. "From there the raw feed material is sent to the primary scalping screen for the separation of the particle sizes into either coarse gravel or fine sand."

"The coarse gravel is sent to a log washer for scrubbing out unsuitable silts, clays and deleterious substances. The material is then fed on to a three-deck finishing screen for a final rinse and sizing to produce the proper gradations of Illinois Department of Transportation [IDOT] specified ‘A' quality coarse aggregates.

Sand Valley photo

"The fine sand is sent in the opposite direction to a classification tank for hydraulic sizing using water to determine particle sizing based on relative buoyancies. The automated classification tank then discharges materials as required to meet IDOT ‘A' quality fine aggregate specifications into dewatering screws, which discharge on to conveyors for stacking materials into load out stockpiles.

"This plant utilizes gravity to move the raw material from the top of the plant downward while sorting into seven different products from a single feed source," he said.

Sand Valley is now operating more efficiently, according to Scharf.

"With a perfect split — rock vs. sand, we could actually do up to 1,500 tons per hour. The sand side can do about 1,000 tons per hour and the rock side can do a little more than 500 tons per hour."

He is also happy he has Robison and Finkbiner Equipment to rely on.

"Clyde's the best in the business. For anything aggregates or crushing related, he's definitely the man. We're blessed to have his help with projects like this, especially. And he's a good friend to boot," said Scharf. CEG