Assesment of stone crushing characteristics and development of a stone crusher for small scale entrepreneurs

Abstract

In Civil Engineering and Construction Industry, crushed stones are known as aggregates and are the basic materials in modern construction work. The current methods for crushing stones to produce aggregates are characterized by the use of large, expensive and centralised crushing plants, which are beyond the reach of small scale entrepreneurs. In addition, such centralized plants are often located too far away from the point of use of aggregates leading to prohibitively high cost of the same. On the other hand there is widespread practice of manual “hammer and anvil” stone crushing especially in rural areas. Though, the practice is hazardous, laborious and hardly profitable, the technology is common in Kenya. It is against this background that the proposed research work has been formulated in order to study the crushing characteristics of various stones and to subsequently come up with an optimum, dynamical ad structural design of a small stone crusher for small scale entrepreneurs. The study will contribute to the body of knowledge in the domain of innovative development of Engineering products; the case in point being a small- mechanised stone crusher that is cost effective, environmentally and user friendly. Further, the study will generate information on stone characteristics that are relevant in aggregate formation.