Mixers, Pumps and Delivery Systems
Consistent Masonry Mix on Demand
A gravity-fed silo system combined with a conventional mortar mixer is a reliable way to produce a consistent mortar mix and keep your crew members on the site busy at all times. Silo systems can be delivered and assembled with minimal effort and hold up to 15,000 pounds of pre-blended mortar, core fill grout or stucco. That means you can order up to five, 3,000-pound bulk bags and simply load them into the silo. Laborers can then dispense the pre-blended mix directly into a conventional mixer, add water, mix, and produce consistent batches as needed.
When using pre-blended products, you can rest assured you’ll always get a consistent mix that’s pretested to ASTM specifications. Plus, you’ll save money on labor and increase the productivity of your team.
In the past, the type of masonry product you mixed determined the type of mixer you would have on site. With recent advancements, you now can mix masonry products in a mortar mixer that incorporates rotating blades. These high-volume mortar mixers eliminate the need to have a separate mixer. Builders now have the opportunity to reduce the number of large tools on the jobsite that need to be cleaned and maintained daily.
Taking control of the mess
A silo and conventional mixer combination helps increase the efficiency of producing mortar, grout and stucco by eliminating the need to buy smaller bags of cement and sand separately. Laborers must then contend with finding the right balance of masonry mix, sand and water, which can inevitably result in poor consistency. These variables can affect directly the workability of the masonry mix and product specifications, as well as the color and texture of the finished product. Creating the wrong mix due to inconsistencies could result in having to tear down your work and start over – a costly mistake that nobody wants to make.
Working with bags also requires more people to load the silo and more time to get the mixer started. Your workers also must also deal with a tremendous amount of airborne dust from cutting open hundreds of bags, and then properly disposing of the paper waste. With environmental concerns taking center stage on so many worksites today, laborers are asked to be aware of the dust they create, especially when in close proximity to the public. Keeping the dust down should be on everyone’s list.
Why use a silo and mixer?
- Ensures consistency with every batch
- Improves productivity
- Eliminates the need to order separate components
- Optimizes workspace
- Reduces labor and lost time moving and breaking open bagged products
- Reduces dust and paper waste.
Dialing in the perfect mix
Advances in continuous mixers are gaining the attention of more builders as quality, ease of use and durability increase. Mixers like the Amerimix D-35 continuous mixer are attached directly to the silo and are designed to work with factory pre-blended mortars, grouts and stuccos. The unique mixing paddle configuration – in conjunction with the agitators – folds and sheers the products to efficiently mix the material and mechanically entrain air for maximum workability and boardlife.
The D-35 can be attached to any Amerimix silo for a turnkey solution for mixing consistent batches. Simply add a water supply from a hose or potable water tank and let the mixer do its job. Since the D-35 Mixer mixes material and water to exact ratio specifications, you can choose how much product you need at any given time and minimize waste. The D-35 is self cleaning within minutes, and there is no need to break apart the machine just to shut it down for the night.
Continuous Mixer advantages
- Push-button ease
- Reduce waste by making only the amount of product needed
- Perfect consistency
- No jobsite mixer required
- Increase productivity
- Minimize labor
- Easy operation and clean out.
Dry to wet, on demand
- Crews will save time and money on the jobsite by getting consistent materials with just the push of a button.
Delivering the goods
Pump systems are time savers on sites that require a consistent flow of material to workers. The D-35 Continuous Mixer from Amerimix is equipped to supply pump systems with a consistent mix of product that can be sent 50 feet up or 125 feet horizontally to workers. This helps eliminate the back-and-forth hauling of tubs that interrupts workflow multiple times throughout the day.
When concrete, mortar and stucco are consistent and readily available on a worksite, the rest of the team can excel at their jobs. The right delivery tools make all the difference.
| Product Watch |
 The Thin Line III Mortar Pump was designed with the masonry, tile, restoration, stone and paver contractor in mind. The pump was designed to allow one man to cover 1,000 to 1,400 square feet in six hours, operating at variable speeds up to two gallons per minute. Slower speeds allow precision in delicate pointing applications, while higher speeds permit efficient grouting of large voids, door jams, etc.
The hopper holds four cubic feet of mortar and pumps 50 feet straight up. With the addition of a spray gun and compressor, the pump also can be used for spraying mortar and texture coating. It is three to five times faster than manual bagging and slicking, and does a neater job with less clean-up time, reducing job time and labor costs. The pump is portable, with a lightweight compact design, and can be taken up on a scaffold or rolling stage with ease. The machine come with two nozzle tips (any size), two ??-inch diameter hoses (25- or 50-foot length), and a 75-foot external on/off switch. It operates on 110 volts (or 220 volts if required), and is made of long-lasting, heavy gauge steel construction. Learn more at www.torchlake.com/thinlinepump. |
| Product Watch |
 The 2,200-pound Capacity Pan Mixer from Blastcrete Equipment Co. is a hydrostatic batch mixer designed for refractory installations and precast refractory shapes manufacturing. Featuring the capability of ??-inch aggregate and mix time of two to three minutes, this pan mixer is able to mix up to one-metric ton of refractory castable.
The Pan Mixer is designed for safe and easy operation, with a 15-square foot operator platform that includes a user-friendly control panel for mixing and material discharge operations. The bottom discharge features a hydraulically-activated sliding door, allowing material to be quickly discharged from the mixer, where it is carried to a pump or transported into a mold. Material discharge height is variable up to 72 inches, thanks to adjustable telescoping legs. Standard with a 40-HP electric motor with starter and disconnect, the pan mixer can be customized with voltage and Hz options. Visit www.blastcrete.com. |
| Product Spotlight |
 The PumpMaster PG-30 from AIRPLACO is a new addition to the PumpMaster line of masonry grout pumps. The PG-30 is engineered and manufactured for masonry grouting applications, such as blockfill and mortar hoisting. The PumpMaster PG-30 is a complement to the model PG-25, which is designed for masonry wall grouting with fine grouts. Model PG-30 features a higher output and larger aggregate capabilities. The PG-30 will pump up to 10 yards per hour, allowing contractors to cycle through a typical ready-mix truck delivery. It includes dual four-inch pumping cylinders and a swing tube material valve, for pumping coarse grouts with aggregates up to ??-inch minus through larger diameter hoses. Visit www.airplaco.com for more information. |
| New Wetmix System from SpecMix |
 The SPEC MIX D2W WETMIX continuous mixing system is designed to give the mason contractor control over the key elements that allow him to make a profit. For example, what does a masonry foreman do when he has to grout a CMU wall by the end of the day to stay on the GC’s schedule, but it’s 3 p.m., and the ready-mix truck delivering eight yards of core fill is an hour late? Does the foreman reschedule the grout pour for the following morning, or keep his crew onsite until the truck arrives, paying his crew overtime? Either way, the mason contractor loses both time and money – not an efficient solution to a common job site problem.
The SPEC MIX D2W WETMIX allows a mason contractor to mix grout and mortar on site, whenever the crew needs the material. With an output rate at nearly eight cubic yards of grout per hour, the system will produce the material needed to efficiently keep a standard grout pump and masonry crew busy reinforcing a wall. The system also can be reloaded with SPEC MIX bulk bags as your team places the grout. The SPEC MIX D2W WETMIX can mix a 10-cubic-foot tub of mortar in less than five minutes with the push of a button. The system uses a unique array of specialized mixing paddles and agitators that fold and sheer the material to efficiently hydrate the dried aggregate, and mechanically work natural air into the material for maximum workability. It is no longer necessary to place a laborer at the mixing station to shovel sand or operate a silo; it can all be accomplished from the seat of a jobsite forklift with the use of a wireless remote control. The driver can place a tub underneath the mixer, push a button on the remote and drive away. The mixer automatically stops at the set time. Control panels allow the operator to preset the batch size from as little as a five-gallon pail of material to a mud tub to continuous output, eliminating material waste by rightsizing batches to the required work. A specialized water pump panel allows the contractor to control the water-to-cement ratio of the material, making material testing virtually obsolete. The system runs on single-phase, 230-volt, 50-amp power. Its direct connection to the bottom of a SPEC MIX Silo eliminates any dust associated with mixing cementitious materials. The SPEC MIX D2W WETMIX also has a preset cleaning cycle that flushes the mixing chamber with water until it is clean, and then automatically shuts off. |
andy.brinkmeier@oldcastle.com.