Drill increases productivity

A new drilling machine launched in the UK by Skelair has quadrupled drilling productivity at a limestone quarry in Tadcaster, Yorkshire.

The Marini Voyager is a compact, 1,000kg, track-mounted machine that can be fitted with either an on-board petrol engine or an electric motor, both of which can be removed and used as a remote power pack if required.

On its first project at the quarry, the Voyager was used to drill horizontal and vertical bore holes for the insertion of diamond wire to cut stone blocks. Fitted with a pneumatic down-the-hole percussive hammer, the machine can drill a 90mm diameter hole through rock at the rate of 1m every 3min.

Lee Wright, quarry supervisor, commented: ‘This machine is four times faster than the rotary drills we have used up to now, which took about 12min to drill a metre. Accuracy has also been excellent and, using a laser line and level, we have no difficulty in lining up the vertical and horizontal bores to take the diamond wire. Set-up time is also reduced because there is no need to chain the machine down and we can now drill a 7m vertical hole in an hour from start to finish, instead of half a day.’