High specification aggregates production

In addition to operating what is probably the lowest quarry on earth, the Advanced Crusher Company also runs Jordan's only Basalt quarry. Al-Hallabat is located 70km to the east of Amman and the company opened it two years ago in a bid to improve the road construction material available to the Jordan market.

Despite only being open for a short time, ACC is already working on increasing the capacity by supplementing the 350tonne per hour fixed crushing and screening plant with a new mobile unit to take production up to 850tonnes per hour.

"Al-Hallabat is the only basalt quarry in Jordan. There was another opened in 1975 but it was only operational for 10 years," said Advanced Crusher Company deputy general manager Mahmoud Alsaidi.

The quarry was opened two years ago and has many years of reserves.
It was very complicated to get permission for the site - it took two years in total - but the company considered it worth the investment because of the high quality deposit and its position close to Amman.

Extraction is by drill and blast and there is usually at least one blast per day. Each blast uses 50 to 100 drill holes with an 875mm diameter to a depth of 15 to 20m with a 1.8m spacing.

The site has five 395 Caterpillar wheeled loaders, one Cat excavator and two Cat dozers, as well as 10 3816 Belaz 35tonne rigid dump trucks for hauling from the quarry face to the fixed crushing plant. However Al-Hallabat site manager Omar Alserdi said that the Belaz trucks may be replaced with Cat 772 or 770 trucks in the near future. "We are currently reviewing which size would be most economical for the operation here," he said.

At the moment material is loaded at the face by both wheeled loaders and excavators and hauled to a fixed crushing and screening plant but the site is in the process of installing a 460 Sandvik mobile crusher. The company is also investing in a Sandvik drilling rig which Alsaidi has said will improve the quality of the blasting.

The fixed crushing and screening plant is an 1736 SBM unit with a primary jaw crusher and a secondary cone crusher and four screens with a capacity of 350tonnes per hour. The new mobile unit will take production up to 850tonnes per hour.

Alsaidi said that the company invested in the quarry as it wants to be able to produce European specification road construction material to raise the standard of Jordan's roads.