Notes on Quarry Operation (circa 1974)

By Bill Fox Retired Senior Operations Specialist

Redi-Mix Australia

MAIN POINTS TO BE OBSERVED BY A MANAGER

WHEN TAKING OVER AN ESTABLISHED QUARRY

1. “Do not walk where angels fear to tread.” Whilst previous experience and training may dictate that the bearing making the most noise should get first attention, this is the trap to avoid. The area of most expenditure in a hard rock quarry is the plant. You may be tempted to attack this first – Don’t! The intricacies of plant design make it hard to assess the problems, other than outstanding ones at first glance. This is an area where prior operations must be fully understood before “sticking your neck out.”

2. As you are endeavoring to establish a reputation as a manager of the quarry with the staff employed in the quarry, you must realize that they have to work for you and for the company. They must have a leader to respect – one whose direction they can follow without too much uneasiness and with confidence. So, select an area to attack that is not too involved, but one which will show immediate results.

3. Get the place cleaned up! This shows immediate results and gives an opportunity to have a good look around without snooping.

4. Because you are experienced in a particular field (say Civil, Mechanical or Electrical Engineering) this could influence our area of operation. Put your attributes in your pocket and save them for a time when you can use them to good effect.

5. The drilling operations of a quarry put you on the top of the face. From here you can watch the operations at leisure and note the trucking, loading and general methods of working. As most quarries are renowned for untidy quarry practices, both in drilling and blasting, you can improve these without too much trouble by using basic techniques. Note, at this stage, you have not interfered with the normal operations down the line.

6. From you pinnacle on top of the quarry, you note the shovel operators and quarry personnel, such as Jackhammer men: supervision without spying. Don’t drive around with a look of brilliance on your face because each one of these men is possibly more capable of doing his particular job than you. You will not get their respect unless you can prove that you are capable of extracting the most out of them whilst they are still enjoying it.

7. Having fixed the drilling and fragmentation now look at the loading operations. How are they digging? Your improvement in blasting techniques has made their job easier. Watch for floor husbandry and get to know the operators. The loader driver can make or break your production schedule. If he requires a rest, all he has to do is slip in a large stone. His excuse is that you won’t see all the big ones because of the angle of the boom, the dust, or any other reason which he has no trouble in dreaming up. If his job is made easier by your improvements, at least you are gaining people for your team.

8. Teamwork is the main thing you are aiming for. At this stage you should have a drilling and shooting team and a shovel team (or operator) on your side. Do not go any further forward until you are sure that they will remain on your side. The quarry haulage is next in line. Give the operators some incentive to look after their units. As an example, pay them 15-30 minutes per day extra to keep their vehicles clean, but make sure they are clean. Make drivers aware of the price of tires and the ratio of their wages to new tire prices.

9. The availability of stone to the crusher has improved. The size is now acceptable and the quantity is slowly increasing. The primary crusher now becomes your bottleneck. Have a good look and listen to suggestions of how it could be made to give more through put. Listen! Do not tell the people involved. They will have an answer or suggestions, especially if you plant the seed in their minds. If they tell you how to do it after you have told them, then you are winning.

If the plant is large enough to have a primary, secondary and tertiary section, appoint someone in charge of the primary. This will make him keen to show that he can push output through and give him some measure of personal satisfaction.

10. Personal satisfaction or sense of achievement must be engendered into every operator. If he is not paid by an incentive scheme, then what makes him go? The personal satisfaction of doing a good job in the team. Give credit where credit is due.

Again you are only as good as they allow you to be!! You must appreciate that all these people have wives and families and friends, and without a sense of achievement they have no goal to work for. Without a good captain the team is useless.

11. When selecting a team, watch for the people who can change sides readily. Watch for people who accept every change without question. They can, and will, just as readily change back again with the first sign of trouble. When the time comes that you are in strife it is reassuring to know that all hands will be put to the wheel. Watch for the people who will not change! When your back is turned they will revert to the old methods on which their reputations were built and prove you wrong using their own set of standards. In animal cunning they would leave you for dead!!

12. Make everyone aware of production figures. Get the daily production to mean something. Have your foreman “tons conscious.” No tons: no profit – no profit: no work – no work: no money, etc. Make every day a winner and do not bank on tomorrow to make history. At least try to do it every day.

13. At this stage the secondary unit should be feeling the pinch. Stone is coming forward and now it is easy to check on by-pass facilities, crusher settings, etc. This is easy at this stage, but had you started by initiating a series of changes to be made on first entering the plant, it would be easy to prove you wrong. The shovel driver loads a series of large stones and virtually stops production, or the old hands gang up and play dead. Do not take another step until you have one foot on solid ground.

14. There are many weird and wonderful combinations of crusher settings, screen sizes and methods used to crush stone. The “old hands” do it by “fee.” They do not need to maintain the plant too often because they can sense when something is going to happen! They have always done it this way; the Company has made a big profit so they must be right.

Unless you want to be a crusher feeder or plant operator, tread carefully. They must be shown the advantages of the modern methods of plant maintenance, etc., but do not try to change their ideas too radically, just bend them. Show them how this is going to make their job easier, but do not rob them of their personal satisfaction and reputation.

15. Do not try to make a “silk purse out of a sow’s ear.” Do not expect written reports, statistics or costs from the average quarry personnel. He believes he is there to crush stone and, peculiarly enough, so are you. Do not flaunt figures, etc., in their faces until they are ready to accept them. The fact that you are right in your assertions and that everyone else is wrong is little comfort if you run the show on your own.

16. The effect of your management should now be obvious. Production is increasing and the team effort coming to the fore.

Now is the time to police the weighbridge, dumps, workshops, coating staff, etc. Again, the same basic rules apply.

Sure, this is common sense, but it does not follow necessarily that the production of common sense keeps pace with position or salary rises of your staff.

17. Make decisions quickly and decisively and be aware of the fact that this is what you are paid for.

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