Problem
At the ship unloading conveyors at Arcelor Mittal in France, matter was accumulating along the belt and at the transfer points, which was reducing material flow. Arcelor Mittal had to increase the number of stops to manually clean up the material, generating fairly substantial additional costs, not to mention the maintenance planning headaches.
Solution
Arcelor Mittal contacted Martin Engineering for advice. Martin recommended installing Martin® Hurricane Air Cannons on the back of the chute with a Martin® SMART™ Series Jet Nozzle programmed to fire every half hour.
Martin® Air Cannons improve material flow in silos, bins, bunkers, and storage vessels by knocking down rat holes, blockages, and buildups to boost plant efficiency. The Martin® SMART™ Series Jet Nozzle eliminated the time and cost of cutting holes and breaking refractory to replace worn-out nozzles.
Results
After the first month, Arcelor Mittal reported an 80% reduction in the number of stops for cleaning. Additionally, Arcelor Mittal has started the process to add this solution to all transfer points experiencing similar problems.
