sand and gravel pit dragline excavator or dredge

I went to look at buying a screen to use for what ever the purpose may be. it was for sale, do to just sitting there with no future plans as they were retired.

The screen 16 x 6 triple deck and raises up like a semi dump trailer has a continental diesel power unit

The screen was for a sand/gravel pit that really never took off, only about a 1 to 3/4 acre area size was the pit area or pond about 20' depth of water and was on a 90 acre site.

larger populated towns are closer to this, the other sand pits are father away.

The owner stated that is goal or thoughts were in the end to have a couple pay lakes after mining

Well to make the story short I just came out and asked if any thought of letting me mine it out as I have some decent size equipment the answer was: yes they would entertain that of coarse they would get some royalties also so I have a question: what would be fair on royalties anyone ? after all they nice enough to entertain it. and let me have a crack at it.

next question what the best cheapest way to extract this sand and gravel ?
I own a 600 excavator and 50ton trucks
Would it be better for a dragline
what about a smaller dredge

just thinking this out

You may want to find out how deep you'll be permitted to dig. If your allowed only 30-40' a dragline will be able to do the job efficiently. A dragline would probably have a lower initial cost too. If your permit allows you to dig deeper, a dredge will be much more efficient. The deeper a dragline digs, the longer the cycle times. Where a dredge doesn't care of its digging 30' or if its digging 90'. If it were me, I'd start off with a dragline. If business takes off and you need to go after the deeper sand,a dredge can always reach the material that the drag couldn't efficiently reach.

I would think since you already have the excavator and trucks, you would be better going that route, and potentially looking at a dredge late on to go deeper. How deep is the ground water? If it's not right at the surface, you may be able to bench the deposit to a little ways above the water line, and then take a second pass to dig as deep as you can before going to a dredge.

Brian

Fiat41B are you familiar with mining sand and gravel? MSHA?

Yea I'm some what familiar with sand and gravel and I have my own msha id #
also i have a qualified approved plan on file with msha
part 46 and part 48 which is coal and it supersedes 46
this place is high ground elevation 602 and falls to bottom ground 534 elevation around 100 acres right now I would stay up top
and work in the drier material there is some big conglomerate on site

So with the screen you have the potential to make 4 different products if you count what doesn't pass the top deck. What's the plan for the oversize that doesn't pass the top deck? How big is the big conglomerate? Will you need a grizzly before the material goes to the screen? What is your plan for all the oversize? With a jaw and a closed circuit on a cone or impactor you could probably make some decent products. Or you could stockpile all the oversize and then run it thru separately and make a near 100% fracture product.
Just thinking out loud,
Mike

Sounds fun! At the risk of being a wet blanket,,, Have you penciled this out to return a projected net of 40% or better? Not to be a s**t but 40% projected, usually boils down to 20% before govt interference. Best to you and I hope you knock 'em dead.

Well sounds like your in tune with Msha, so you can get the screen running. The excavator you already have so that would be the machine I'd go with for now. Your feed system will be more important than your dredging system at this point. Like stonebreaker says you have to know what the market in your area need and us for materials. One thing I've found that oversize doesn't rot in the pile so when you stock pile it put it in a place it can sit for a few years without being in your way.

The big question would be what is the market for the materials you could produce with just a screen deck.
We dig concrete agg out of a pond, screen out anything over 7/8 inch. That material runs to a jaw, then a 3 deck screen and additional cones setup to run 3/4 minus. The original screened 7/8's and smaller gets stockpiled and then runs through a washplant setup for 2 different sands and other clean concrete agg.

Just running a triple deck screen out of the water isn't really an option with our material. It would be to dirty and clog screens, and the amount of water needed to keep it running would wash all the sand away.

Funny thing is with our current depth and location in the hole our most profitable product right now is 3/8 to #4 pea gravel. So profitable we don't sell to outside sales as we use everything we get in our concrete.

The conglomerate is big but I can rip it lots of gravel in it have not done anything there yet, trying to get other stuff out of the way first.
There is a old screw at the site needs to be set up again, there is a old stationary simplicity 3 deck screen piped with spray nozzles that has 4 shoots at the end, one went to the screw so I'm guessing that was the old plant and there is 3 large transformers for power use to be a large conveyor there at one time. there is also a trammel screen I found with a deck around it and a hopper with legs needs assembled. like everything else.

Maybe post some pics of the conglomerate and some pics of the eqpt on hand?
Mike