If you’re thinking about adding a rock crusher to your arsenal, there’s a big decision in your future. From efficient yet portable models to massive workhorses, your rock crusher options vary widely. Let’s take a closer look at buying a rock crusher and how to make the most of this investment.
Before we get too far into the details, consider what you’ll get out of your rock crusher. These machines are excellent additions to many job sites, as they can help mitigate the skyrocketing costs of raw materials and support more eco-friendly construction practices — a win-win in the bid process and addition to your bottom-line profitability.
Rock crushers can convert old, unwanted materials, such as concrete, granite, asphalt, limestone and basalt, even glass into new base materials for further building. They often reduce or eliminate the need for raw materials. When you reuse old concrete or process stone, you save on costs through:
Aside from costs, rock crushers also help the planet by keeping recycled materials out of landfills and contributing to Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) certification. Concrete is the most recycled material on earth! Understanding the advantages of rock crushers can help you better align your purchase with your goals. Whether you’re after a cost-saving measure, an eco-friendly tool or a mix of both, a rock crusher is a great pick.
Now that you know what they can do, it’s time to figure out what style will best fit your workflow. Rock crushers come in a few different options, with crushing mechanisms designed for various processing stages. These stages include primary, secondary and tertiary or final reduction crushing.
In the primary crushing phase, the rock gets reduced to a small enough size for the secondary crusher, which further reduces the material to match the requirements of the tertiary or final crusher. The tertiary or final reduction crusher refines and shapes the material to its end product. You’ll find some overlap in what types of crushers are used at which stage.
Jaw rock crushers use powerful compressive forces to break up the rock between two opposing jaw plates. They are the most common crusher used in the primary stage. They work on many kinds of materials and tend to produce less dust. Their output produces sharp angles and edges on the material often preferred by engineers for their gripping and setting strength. The are also the best crusher style to handle rebar and wire in concrete.
Impact crushers come in vertical and horizontal varieties. Vertical shaft impactors (VSIs) and horizontal shaft impactors (HSIs) use impact forces, utilizing blow bars (rotors) spinning at high rpm’s and throwing the material against the wall of the crusher to break them apart. They produce a more rounded material and are the primary crusher type used to process soft, gummy asphalt.
You’ll typically find impact crushers used in primary, secondary, and tertiary or final crushing, as they can help shape the rock and produce fine materials. They work well with abrasive rocks. Impact crushers can create significant dust, so you may need to take caution on some job sites. Their inherent design is not the best for concrete with wire and rebar. Vertical Shaft Impactors (VSI’s) are also know as Sandmakers for the small size material they can produce.
A cone crusher is a large drum with a cone in the middle like an upside-down funnel surrounded by a concave ring on the wall of the drum. The cone moves inside the drum in an elliptical grinding motion. As the rock moves down the edges of the drum, it gets broken up into smaller pieces as the gap between the cone and wear ring on the wall narrows.
Cone crushers can accommodate medium-hard and hard materials, and they’ll work with some abrasive feeds. They can produce smaller materials, making cone crushers a popular choice for secondary and tertiary crushing.
A portable rock crusher plant includes different types of rock crushers for an all-in-one solution. You can take these rock-crushing plants on-site to crush and screen materials to finish the process with one piece of equipment. They include multiple crushers, screeners, and conveyor recycle systems all on one chassis.
In addition to the three main types of crushers above, there are many other types of crushing machinery more specialized and/or variations on the above. There are roller mills with pins or wheel type rollers, vertical roller mills, hammer mills, and ball mills which are large drums with steel or ceramic balls as grinding media that can produce material down to 400 mesh (think baby powder fineness). These are all specialty type material reducing machinery almost exclusively used in stationary plants for reduction down to very fine material. STAY TUNED AS SENYA CRUSHERS ADDS ADDITIONAL CRUSHER TYPES TO OUR HIGHLY PORTABLE MICRO LINEUP!
Rock crushers come in portable, mobile, and stationary options. Portable crushers refer to machinery on trailers with wheels for the maximum on portability. Mobile crushers are crushers on tracks, like models with built-in crawlers, and are valued due to their mobility once on site, especially in larger crusher machinery. They require prime moves to get them to the work site and sacrifice a bit in portability. Stationary crushing equipment is machinery that stays in place once commissioned like in traditional quarries and aggregate producing plants. Though we can provide even the largest crushing plant design in the world, Senya Crushers specializes in our ultra-portable MICRO rock crushers, small enough to be towed with just a pickup truck! They’re perfect for job sites with limited space, smaller amounts of materials to process, or remote sites though they are workhorses designed to handle larger, more permanent crushing jobs as well.
For many small and mid-sized projects, our ultra-portable MICRO rock crushers offer all the benefits of a larger machine alongside extensive flexibility, portability, not to mention affordability. They move the crushing plant to the rocks, bringing crushing capabilities on site. If you need larger processing capacity, mobile systems and portable systems alike can accommodate higher capacities as we builder crushers with a large range of output capacities. Many mid-sized portable options offer the best of both worlds. We also offer 3 in 1 and 4 in 1 systems incorporating primary and even secondary crushers accompanied by a screen plant on a single chassis able to be pulled with a prime mover.
With your newfound knowledge of rock crushers, how do you know which one is right for your work? Start by considering the following aspects:
The best type of rock crusher will depend on your application and operations. MICRO or small rock crushers are ideal for small and mid-sized contractors who move job sites often and need general-purpose crushing capabilities. Portable crushing plants can accomplish comprehensive crushing on-site for an end-to-end solution. Although they come assembled, they aren’t quite as easy to move as MICRO crushers and may require larger transportation equipment. Stationary rock crushers can accomplish primary, secondary or tertiary crushing with high efficiency and performance. Many crawl crushers fit these demands, too, with the added benefit of easy transportation. The right rock crusher for your work depends on many factors, but you can always contact the pros at Senya Crushers for support.
Everyone would like a crusher where you can put a big piece in one end and get very small output on the other and is highly affordable as well. There simply is no such thing. The crushing business is a lot like milling steel down to size. It usually takes multiple crushers, crusher types, and processing machinery working together to get the desired result. Without a doubt, each crushing situation is unique. As we often say, “there are no shortcuts to bustin’ rocks!”
Our knowledgeable team members are ready to help you find the perfect rock crusher from our selection of USA-made crushers, screen plants and conveyors. With high-quality Yanmar diesel generators and no hydraulics, our customers have negligible maintenance and operational costs. Plus, our unmatched support and in-person training allow you to be confident in your new equipment.
With our owner Jun Sui, a nuclear engineer originally who personally conceived and designed our MICRO Crushers, actively involved in our day-to-day operations, you will find no company from the top on down more committed to our quality of machinery as well as customer satisfaction. These machines are our “babies” at Senya Crushers made with our own hands, and we truly think of our customers as our extended “crusher family”. We are very proud to say our expertise in finding and maintaining the most cost effective and efficient solution to your crushing needs is unsurpassed here at Senya Crushers!
Explore our rock crushers online, contact us to get in touch with a crushing expert, or better yet COME SEE US HERE IN RALEIGH NC!
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