“In Wisconsin, you will see a lot of portable plants,” Wise says. “I see a lot of stationaries that are sitting there – some of the big quarries in Milwaukee and a couple around here. But most companies have portable plants.”
Go-to equipment
Wingra Stone, for instance, bought a Kleemann MR 130 impact crushing plant a few years ago that’s utilized within different operations and to produce a variety of materials. When Portable Plants visited last November, the MR 130 was recycling concrete at Wingra Stone’s Kampmeier Quarry in McFarland, Wisconsin.
“This is our third season with the MR 130,” Wise says. “It’s been a nice addition to our fleet so we can move around and do small projects. We do road projects for customers, and it gives us the ability to move it around.”
Wingra originally demoed the MR 130 before renting it and, ultimately, purchasing the machine. More recently, Wingra purchased a Hitachi ZX350LC excavator to pair with the MR 130.
“That’s the main machine feeding that Kleemann,” Wise says. “We have a hammer for it, and we can either break boulders for riprap or break concrete that needs to be broken down and hammered.”
The ZX350LC is an upgrade compared to its predecessor, Wise adds.
“Before, we had a [machine] that was too big,” he says. “The bucket was too big to feed the hopper.”
Wingra also operates an MS 952 screening plant from Kleemann, and it demoed an MS 15 Z screening plant late last year that impressed Wise.
“It actually worked out well,” he says, adding that Roland Machinery Co. serves Wingra as its Kleemann dealer. “We don’t have a need for it right now, but it did a really good job and made quite a bit of riprap.”
Utilizing used
New isn’t always the path Wingra Stone takes to find equipment solutions. Although Wingra recently purchased a pair of John Deere 824 wheel loaders and it is waiting on a dragline replacement to arrive at its Zander Quarry in Cross Plains, Wisconsin, used equipment has a place at just about every Wingra aggregate operation.
“Take a jaw,” Wise says. “It may be old, but there’s nothing to a jaw. It’s the same with screens if you maintain them. They’re a lot nicer when they’re new, but for what we’re doing they work. There’s only so many moving parts in them.”
Still, certain applications require a more unique approach with equipment. Take one at the Zander Quarry as an example.
“It’s easier to find an excavator operator than a dragline operator,” Wise says. “With C. Norris [Manufacturing] out of Ohio, they specialize in making long sticks for excavators that are built to dig down. So we’re putting an 80-ft. stick on the Hitachi 870 with a 4-yd. bucket, matching the size of the bucket to the dragline. We’ll be able to get another 10 ft. deeper.”