Delta-blade mixer helps Flowcrete meet increased demand

Sandbach, UK – Flowcrete UK Ltd has installed a delta-blade (or plough-type) mixer from John R Boone to mix 3.36 tonne batches of cementitious flooring products.

Sandbach, Cheshire-based Flowcrete is a major producer of resin and cementitious products, which it supplies to contractors in the flooring market.

The JR Boone mixer was chosen to replace an existing mixer when Flowcrete needed to increase capacity because of high demand for its products.

The new unit offers higher efficiency due to its blade profile, which delivers a very high shear, completely fluidising the blend for a very short mix time, said JR Boone.

We spent a lot of time prototype testing; making sure that we had the confidence that our product could be taken from a test mixer (224kg batches) located at JR Boones Congleton site, to the full 3360 kg batch size,” said Neil Phuler, Flowcrete’s resource manager.

Size constraints within the Sandbach factory meant that a further challenge was to install the new equipment in the same footprint as the old mixer.

JR Boone’s horizontal delta-blade mixers have short L/D aspect ratio, which helped them with this and the discharge from the mixer is via a ’bomb door’ allowing almost instantaneous discharge from the mixer and meaning that the mixer is immediately ready for the next batch of product.

“With the new mixer, the new plant is performing exceptionally well,” reports Phuler. “With the old system a batch was taking up to 45 minutes to complete and we could only have a single batch in the system at any one time.

’We now have a 10 minute cycle time and up to four batches in progress simultaneously, which has allowed Flowcrete UK Ltd to increase production from 8500 tonnes per annum to in excess of 20000 tonnes per annum; all achieved with no changes to the building or staffing levels and generating a very rapid return on investment.”