Rio Tinto Borax, world leader in borate technology, continues to invest in Dino bulk truck loaders from Van Beek in Drunen, the Netherlands. They have been using these bulk truck loaders for 15 years! Borax is a mining company in borates (naturally occurring minerals) and part of the Rio Tinto group. The name Borax has been derived from the mineral of the same name, which was already known in ancient times and used for the production of glass.
Mr. Cees de Graauw, Global Project Manager, explains that “For 15 years Borax has been one of Van Beek’s most satisfied customers. We bought our first Dino for Borax Rotterdam in 1995. Some years later I was looking for a trans-shipment solution in Asia, and I could have bought a machine in Taiwan or Korea, but ultimately I decided I wanted the quality of Van Beek’s machines. And that has proved to be an excellent decision, because our machines are still working!”
“In 1998 we invested in a Dino for Korea, and in a further two Dinos for Taiwan and following that in another two Dinos for Brasil. Sometimes we ship one of our Dinos back home to have it completely overhauled by Van Beek and then deploy it again elsewhere. This is how we sent one reconditioned Dino from Brasil to Germany and one from Korea to Russia.” “In 2002 we designed a twin-Dino together with Van Beek for Korea. This can be used for two different products, which means we do not have to switch or clean the Dino. At the moment we are busy reconditioning a Dino that has come from Brasil for a plant in France.”
“In the course of the years we have made several adjustments and added features. An excellent example is a complete new Dino for our plant in Taiwan, equipped with a magnet, sampler and clod crusher. This machine is going to be used to load the borax, a raw material for the glass industry, so a high-quality application. During the transport of borax in sea containers, soft clods form at the bottom of the container, caused by the pressure. This is not very satisfactory for our customer. In order to guarantee an optimal result in supplying our customer with the borax, the clods are broken up by the Dino whilst loading from the sea container to the silo trucks. Thinking through and designing the adjustments to the Dino to make it completely customer specific, and on top of that the quality aspect, makes us opt for Van Beek!”
The Dino bulk truck loader mentioned by Mr. De Graauw is a DS300 type. That is to say, made of steel, equipped with loading bellows, a lid on the loading funnel and a capacity of 40m3/hour. The clod breaker for breaking up the borax material is located in the loading funnel. The magnet and the sampler can be found in the outlet. The magnet filters out the shards of steel from the product. The sampler can be used both manually and automatically to measure the quality of the product. This ensures that the borax product is filtered and checked immediately before it enters the silo truck. An industrial hoover is used to maintain a partial vacuum of the system for dust-free loading. The Dino DS300 fully complies with all CE standards, health and safety laws, ARAB (Netherlands safety regulation) and TUV (Netherlands commodities Act).
Edited by: Constanze Schmitz
Bulk truck loaders
