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Rockaway Township officials Michael Dachisen, Mayor; Gregory Poff, Business Administrator; Joseph Fiorilla, Community Service Director; Pat Seger, Assistant Business Administrator; Peter Tabbott, Health Officer and James Lutz, Municipal Engineer visited Tilcon's Mt. Hope facility on October 17. The purpose of the visit was to tour the new asphalt plant on site and to gain a better understanding of the mining industry and of Tilcon's day-to-day operations. Many Tilcon representatives were on hand to greet them and to give them a tour of the quarry, asphalt plant, quality control lab and asphalt plant control room.
The first part of the visit was hosted by Brad Carroll, General Manger Aggregates; who took the group on a tour of the 560-acre quarry which surrounds a historic iron ore mine and is one of the largest producers of granite in the United States. Brad explained to the group the geology of the land, production capacity, blasting procedures and how the products are transported to our customers. They were able to see the heavy equipment that is used on site and discussed the maintenance and cost of large vehicles such as haul trucks, front loaders and water trucks. One of the tour stops was to the primary crusher where they witnessed the stone being transported by haul truck and fed into the top of the crusher and then crushed into smaller pieces of rocks. They also were told that rocks can be fed into smaller crushers to be further broken down in size.
Safety is paramount at Tilcon and the group learned about the very strict procedures in place to make sure that the rock is quarried safely and with as little impact as possible on our neighbors and the environment. The quarry has very strict safety guidelines and is frequently inspected by safety agencies to ensure that the rules are continually adhered too. They learned that our wheel wash system is positioned close to the plant so customers can easily drive through the water spray system to clean their wheels as they are exiting the facility. They also were told about our 24/7 security guards who make every effort to try to check each truckload exiting the facility to make sure they are loaded and tarped properly, before entering onto our local roadways.
Tim Snure, Asphalt Manager, spoke to the group about the new state-of-the-art asphalt plant on site, capable of producing 600-tons per hour and storing 2,700 tons of material in nine 300 ton hot storage silos. Tim explained that the energy-efficient Gencor Drum plant is one of the largest asphalt plants in the state. The new plant is situated close to the entrance to the facility and the scale house to provide our customers with convenient, safe and easy access in and out of the facility and a quick turnaround time.
The group also took a tour of the quality control lab which has five dedicated staff members who are all state-certified. There are Lab Stations for the Department of Transportation and other state agencies in view of the plant as well as a sampling platform at the truck exit. Rich Linton, Quality Control Manger, explained the different asphalt mixes that Tilcon produces such as conventional Super pave mixes, stone matrix asphalt (SMA), airport mixes, specialty thin lift mixes along with commercial and warm mix asphalt (WMA).
The final stop was the state-of-the-art control room and new computerized automation system. The mayor and his team asked many questions and were very impressed with the system.
Thanks to Rockaway Township for being such a good neighbor and to all the Tilcon employees involved in helping to make the visit a huge success. A great job was done by all.