The Great Tew Ironstone Quarry in the UK has purchased a new
The DL580-5 carries 14-16 tonne blocks of ironstone from the quarry face to a new £1mn stone processing plant that recently began production at the top of the quarry. Previously, the quarry was only able to move blocks weighing up to a maximum of 10 tonnes.
Great Tew ironstone has a brown and blue vein and is only available from this quarry in North Oxfordshire. The quarried block is often up to 30-tonnes and has a wide variety of uses including building and walling stone, architectural details, mullion windows, copings, quoins and flooring. Smaller quarried block is suitable for rockery stone and one-off garden features. The quarry is located on the historic Great Tew Estate, which has always quarried block for its own use. In 2000 the quarry was opened further to satisfy a wider demand for iys unique ironstone product.
Great Tew is part of Johnston Quarry Group, which supplies quarried and mined block stone in southern England. As well as Great Tew, the group owns and operates Sarsden Quarry in Oxfordshire, Creeton Quarry and Ropsley Quarry both in Lincolnshire and Oathill Quarry in Gloucestershire. The group also runs three Bath stone mines and in total supplies over 60,000 tonnes of stone block and 300,000 tonnes of aggregates per year.
Paul Keyte, operations director at Johnston Quarry Group, said: “We are delighted with the boost in productivity provided by the new DL580-5 and the processing plant, which allows us to process up to 100 tonnes of stone a day. The arrival of the DL580-5 and the opening of the new plant are both timely and are enabling us to meet a significant increase in demand for our Ironstone products in the UK.”
The DL580-5 is equipped with specially matched pallet tines and brings the large blocks from the base of the quarry to the top and along a short road, at the end of which it loads them on to the sawing machines in the processing plant.
The DL580-5 is designed for heavy lifting and features robust structural components and an advanced double circuit axle cooling system. This is designed to ensure that the DL580-5 is suited for both block lifting in quarries and mines, and also heavy-duty applications in industrial, construction and recycling operations.
Its overall size is almost the same as the DL550-5, the next model down in the Doosan range, but it has an operating weight of 36,030kg and higher static tipping loads (straight/full turn 40°) of 29,700 and 26,200 kg respectively.
