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December 2006
by Scott Ellenbecker |
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For Alabaster, Ala.-based American Drilling, mobility is crucial because the company covers the state contract drilling everything from residential water wells to large aggregates operations. However, the bulk of the business is commercial drilling for aggregates operations. American works in 12 different aggregates operations within a 120-mile radius of its home base — with a single operation having 33 working faces. With a strong need for mobility, the contract drilling company opted for an Atlas Copco T4BH drill. According to American Drilling’s Michael Poskey, the unit features rubber-tire mobility that optimizes productivity. Family tradition The family-owned business started in 1984, when Butch Poskey was presented the idea of purchasing the company from a friend. Since then, he and his wife, Sue, and two sons, Michael and Charlie, have grown the business to be a highly efficient and respected operation. |
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Today, they run 13 drills and six cranes. The T4 — both blast hole and water well models — are the workhorses for American, which has seven units in its fleet. The youngest son, Michael, runs the daily operations for the drilling side of the business, while Charlie runs the crane rental business. Butch serves as the company’s overseer and wears many hats — including pushing projects or delivering equipment. The key is that the business is run as a team, and as part of that, Butch says he completely trusts his sons to make things happen. “It works because we work together,” he says, noting that his customers respect the company because of its commitment to detail. “We dot the “i’s” and cross the “t’s” and do what we say we are going to do,” he points out. Forming partnerships Lafarge North America, Inc. and Vulcan Materials Co., two of the largest aggregates companies in the United States, are among American Drilling’s customers. The contract driller has signed on to put 26,000 tons of rock on the ground a day for Lafarge. That means the company is currently running two T4s and a DM30 per aggregates operation. If there is bad weather or a delay for some other reason, Michael pulls drills off another job to compensate for the loss in production. “The secret is to deal with any issues right away,” Butch says. “Not that there are problems, but we wouldn’t want anything to fester.” Michael compliments Lafarge for its knowledge, citing an example of how the company shaves aggregate off the edge of the bench exposing the high-chemical content stone. When the rock doesn’t have the chemical makeup necessary to meet the specifications, Lafarge brings in fines prior to the shot to increase the final quality of the material to be hauled out. “These guys have this down to a science, “ Michael says. The shaving of the bench creates a slope, but sometimes the slope’s incline is too great for the T4BH so a DM30 — another Atlas Copco drill — needs to be brought in. “But much of the time, the T4BH can handle it,” Michael says. Maximizing efficiency Increasing production is exactly what has appealed to some of the major aggregates producers, Michael says, noting that companies such as Lafarge weren’t familiar with the drill’s capabilities. “The folks at Lafarge had never seen a T4 do what we make them do,” Michael says. ‘There is no way we could get the production we do without it.” For example, the T4BH uses 14 gallons of fuel an hour, while the crawlers previously used in this quarry consumed 27 gallons an hour. That decreased the fuel consumption by 5 to 6 cents a ton. Each shot has an average of 65, 5-1/2 inch holes, but that number of holes occasionally increases to 80. Lafarge preps the site with a dozer, cutting the bench down or cleaning it up. The bench will be laid out with holes drilled at 15-foot burden and 18-foot spacing. The average bench will be about 40-feet deep. American will drill approximately 90 percent of the pattern with the T4BH. The DM30 will finish up the holes at the edge of the bench when the slope requires it. This also allows the T4BH to advance to the next face. Tramming a crawler around a quarry takes time. “We focus on production, which could mean on average anywhere from 110 to 160 feet an hour with a T4,” Michael says. “I may get a slightly greater penetration with the DM30, but the savings in time, fuel, and maintenance more than compensates for the loss in footage.” For example, one Calera, Ala., aggregates operation will average 110 to 115 feet per hour, depending on the face and formation, but another nearby quarry with different deposit qualities, the T4BH gets 275 feet an hour. With 33 working faces in the Calera quarry, moving time must be minimized. And because crews are paid bonuses based on footage, the drillers don’t want to waste time tramming, either. Tramming is not the only thing that takes time away from drilling — so does maintenance. “We do 99 percent of all our own service work,” says Michael, adding that he would rather work with the T4BH than a crawler because of the simplicity of maintenance on a rubber tire rig compared to an undercarriage rig. Because the drilling must be close to the edge of the bench — on a slope from 27 to 30 degrees — the T4BH isn’t always the best solution. However, about 98 percent of the time, the T4BH can do the job, Michael says. A drill solution Because mobility is so important to American, it has structured a drill solution that works for them. One solution won’t work for everyone, but because of the scope of the business, the mobility of the T4BH makes it the best suited drill for the job. With the right equipment and a “can-do” attitude, American Drilling has positioned itself as a contractor that does what it takes to get the job done. Scott Ellenbecker is editor-at-large for the Atlas Copco publications M&C USA and Deep Hole Driller. This is an edited version of the original article he wrote that was published in M&C USA. |
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Reprinted from Aggregates Manager Magazine |
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