Byproduct into profit
February 1, 2007 By: Gary Gulick Pit & QuarryA Texas-based trenching and excavating company uses a portable screening plant to transform excess backfill from its trenching operations into processed and sized material for select fill and base material.
H.L. Chapman Pipeline Inc. is a company most contractors have heard of at one time or another. It is one of the largest custom-trenching and rock-excavating companies in the world — and it has a long history of tackling major challenges. H.L. Chapman maintains headquarters in Austin, Texas, and has offices in San Antonio and Las Vegas. It conducts excavating operations in 28 states.
 While working on a road project in central Texas, H.L. Chapman Pipeline Inc. needed a way to turn excess trenching material into a useable product. Its innovative solution came in the form of a track-mounted, mobile screening plant from KPI-JCI — the FT6203. |
Considering its geographical scope, it may seem unusual that the company's business focus is so narrow: H.L. Chapman works solely on trench and excavation, with most of its work being done in rocky terrains. Within this target area, the company has devoted its efforts to learning how to trench and remove rock faster than almost anyone else, without the use of explosives.
With this background, H.L. Chapman frequently looks at problems from many angles to find new approaches. One of its most recent challenges resulted in a decision that was quite unusual, even for a company with 25 years of experience.
Waste not, want not
The problem in this case had to do with excess trenching waste, machine backfill and milled material from a highway project in the Texas Hill Country. The project involved construction of a new toll road, US Highway 183A, which was designed to relieve traffic in the central Texas counties of Travis and Williamson. The new, 11.6-mile highway is being built parallel to existing US 183 and is expected to be complete this spring.
The solution in this case was both unusual and profitable. While raw trenching backfill is often problematic, it is possible to screen it to create products for use in area construction.
For H.L. Chapman, the key was a FT6203 mobile screening plant from KPI-JCI. The FT6203 is one of the world's largest mobile processing plants, designed specifically for recycling and aggregate production, as well as for multiple site-prep applications. Despite the mobility of its track mounting, it can output commercial and spec base, sized course, intermediate and fine materials requiring single-stage reduction.
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In addition, the unit's heavy track drive provides excellent onsite mobility. For longer moves, it is transportable on a low-boy trailer. H.L. Chapman considered it to be a perfect match for the project.
The FT6203 crawls alongside the trenches where rock-cutting machines are at work. It screens the material to make two, and even three products, as needed, for road base and other materials. According to H.L. Chapman's equipment superintendent, Allen Summers, the key to the equipment's on-job success is its ability to move forward alongside the trenching action, thereby eliminating the need to transport the material. It is a surprisingly simple, but effective operation.
"As the material comes out of the trencher or road miner, we scrape it up and build a big berm pile," Summers explained. "Then we set up the screener on a pad right next to the berm pile. We use a backhoe to take the material off the berm and put it into the FT6203."
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