Propel Gains Ground
Propel Industries is gaining business in the highly competitive Indian crushing & screening equipment market over the years, reports NBM&CW.
Having started with modest beginnings in the year 2009, Propel Industries has been able to retain and promote its brand in the highly competitive Indian market, having well entrenched presence of foreign and other Indian manufacturers. The company has also done well in the Middle East markets. Establishment of sound product manufacturing base over the years with backward integration, competitive product placement and appropriate customer support, have enabled, the South India based crushing and screening equipment manufacturer, maintain presence among rivals.
"We started as a contract manufacturing company making components for multinationals. Getting into design and manufacturing of construction and mining equipment was difficult, as we did not have any background in the industry. We started our industry in the middle of a recession in 2010 and that was an added challenge. To get foothold in the industry, we started servicing and refurbishing our competitors' products. This was backed by free replacement guarantee for six months. We started gaining customers' confidence and also learned about possible improvements we can make in our own design. We targeted customers who own western brands and gave attractive offers, so that we can have bench mark references. And that paid off," says Mr. V. Senthil Kumar, Managing Director, Propel Industries. (As our plants are of higher value running into crores, there was an entry barrier as customers were not ready to bet on a new comer. We also priced our products as performance based machinery and we refused to get into price wars). To get a foothold in the industry
Having met with initial success, the second strategy for Propel was to introduce its own products for the Indian market, with high demand appetite, led by rising demand of aggregates from road construction and other infrastructure projects. It began manufacturing, grizzly feeders, jaw crushers and screens. This was gradually followed by manufacturing of cone crushers, vertical shaft impactors and washing plants to produce manufactured sand by setting its new plant.
The forty year old parent company, OPEL's long drawn engineering expertise in manufacturing castings and components to international corporates gave Propel the required knowledge support to manufacture the crushing and screening equipment. To develop the products, Propel engaged foreign design consultants of repute. "I extensively travelled during 2007 and 2008 across major crushing and screening markets in the world, to have a holistic acquaintance with the requirements and challenges of the plant owners. I saw, plant operators were mainly looking to bring running costs down in terms of parts wear, labour and power consumption costs. With the background, targets were set for our design consultants to reduce wearing of parts at least by 20%. Targets were also set up for productivity increment and power consumption reduction by 25%. Based with the advanced features, our prime objective was to produce plants with advanced global features at Indian prices. In conjunction, the idea was to deliver total lifecycle costs to plant owners. Based on the set objective, we are incorporating regular engineering improvisations in our plants," says Mr. Kumar, having a background in industrial product engineering and specialization in textile engineering.
To ensure, Propel's jaw crushers have long product life, the design of the crushers is based on steel casting as compared to fabrication. Mr. Kumar explains, "Steel casting based design makes production costlier by Rs.100/kg as compared to fabrication at Rs.65-70/kg. However, the advantages are many. With fabrication based design, stress on the equipment is relieved over a period of time. This causes deformation in the equipment and subsequent breakage. However, with steel castings, it is annealed and stress relieved. In steel casting, the entire structure is machined in one setting, so that the four bearings will be in concentric line enabling the plant to run for longer period with lesser maintenance".
Close Side Settings (CSS) in Propel's jaw crushers can be adjusted from outside. This makes it safe and easy to operate. The company will soon introduce 600 TPH Jaw Crusher, AVJ 1412 with 1450x1200 mm feed opening for Indian, Middle East and African markets. The target application for AVJ 1412 will be for iron ore crushing, and lime stone crushing for cement plants. According to Mr. Kumar, "With larger opening, our jaw crushers can accommodate larger feed size. This brings the costs down for primary breaking."
Propel in the recent past has introduced its QM-series cone crushers. The fixed shaft crusher comes with hydrostatic bearings and is able to deliver more cubical aggregates based on more rock to rock crushing. With top bearing eliminated, uncrushable materials through the shaft go down faster. Equipped with a heavy concave mantle, the product comes with an extended 30% life. The QM-series cone crushers deliver lesser fines and consume lesser power per ton.
"The Indian plant owners are looking for optimized operations, wherein the existing cone crushers can be altered to produce manufactured sand. The crushing chamber can be altered by changing the conclave and mantle. This will reduce the gap between the concaves and the improved production of fine aggregates," says Mr. Kumar.
For less breakage of steel parts, Propel's grizzly feeders are made of wear resistant steel plates. This enables the feeders to bear the impact of boulders from the rigid dump trucks. The feeders do not run on gear boxes but on vibrating motors. This minimizes the possibility of oil leakages. Recent improvisations have been carried in the screens as well. Instead of welding, the screens are hug bolts fastened. The bolts are pre-stressed. The screens are equipped with four bearings which ensure that both sides of the bearings can vibrate separately. This consequently reduces stress on the units, and resultantly extends the equipment's life.
To make the crushers cost competitive with right quality control, Propel's new plant is completely equipped with fabrication and plasma cutting machine. The factory has in place computerized numerical controls machining units, paint shop, and testing facilities. Settings of the bearings in the jaw crushers are done with the CNC machines. Propel has a completely backward integrated unit and certain critical components for the crushers are manufactured at Opel factory, while certain casting materials are outsourced.
Business of Propel has consecutively grown by sixty percent in last three years consecutively. The growth was contributed by existing and new customers. According to Mr. Kumar, "the appropriate product support has enabled us to build our brand and also make existing customers loyal to us. We strongly ensure that the parts should reach our customers within 24 hours. Besides this, we have arrangements in place with some of our customers in the Eastern part of India to stock our parts in their premises. In case of emergency, we also airlift parts for our customers. To ensure that our plants deliver higher availability, operator's training is given by us in every six months. This enables them to carry out right preventive maintenance of the equipment".
Propel is looking towards dealer development and setting up of a dedicated service team to support the products in the Middle East market. It has recently commissioned a two-stage plant comprising Jaw, Cone and Screens for International Quarry Crushing, Oman. The plant is producing aggregates for road projects in Qatar. Already received repeat orders for one more plant.
Propel is gaining business through the sales of its crushing and screening plants. However, one of the major segments contributing to the kitty is washing plants to produce manufactured sand. According to Mr. Doriaswamy, Vice President-Propel Industries, "With strict ban being enforced by large number of Indian states on Mining River sand, demand for manufactured sand is rising. Currently, many plant owners are demanding 2-3 stages plants to produce manufactured sand to encash the demand. The trend is well likely to gain ground."
Propel launched its washing plants for producing manufactured sand during last Excon 2015. They manufacture sand washer with dewatering screen, 'Pro Wash' and 'Ecowash' involving the wet process besides making Pro Air Classifier for producing sand through the dry process.
Having met with initial success, the second strategy for Propel was to introduce its own products for the Indian market, with high demand appetite, led by rising demand of aggregates from road construction and other infrastructure projects. It began manufacturing, grizzly feeders, jaw crushers and screens. This was gradually followed by manufacturing of cone crushers, vertical shaft impactors and washing plants to produce manufactured sand by setting its new plant.
The forty year old parent company, OPEL's long drawn engineering expertise in manufacturing castings and components to international corporates gave Propel the required knowledge support to manufacture the crushing and screening equipment. To develop the products, Propel engaged foreign design consultants of repute. "I extensively travelled during 2007 and 2008 across major crushing and screening markets in the world, to have a holistic acquaintance with the requirements and challenges of the plant owners. I saw, plant operators were mainly looking to bring running costs down in terms of parts wear, labour and power consumption costs. With the background, targets were set for our design consultants to reduce wearing of parts at least by 20%. Targets were also set up for productivity increment and power consumption reduction by 25%. Based with the advanced features, our prime objective was to produce plants with advanced global features at Indian prices. In conjunction, the idea was to deliver total lifecycle costs to plant owners. Based on the set objective, we are incorporating regular engineering improvisations in our plants," says Mr. Kumar, having a background in industrial product engineering and specialization in textile engineering.
Close Side Settings (CSS) in Propel's jaw crushers can be adjusted from outside. This makes it safe and easy to operate. The company will soon introduce 600 TPH Jaw Crusher, AVJ 1412 with 1450x1200 mm feed opening for Indian, Middle East and African markets. The target application for AVJ 1412 will be for iron ore crushing, and lime stone crushing for cement plants. According to Mr. Kumar, "With larger opening, our jaw crushers can accommodate larger feed size. This brings the costs down for primary breaking."
Propel in the recent past has introduced its QM-series cone crushers. The fixed shaft crusher comes with hydrostatic bearings and is able to deliver more cubical aggregates based on more rock to rock crushing. With top bearing eliminated, uncrushable materials through the shaft go down faster. Equipped with a heavy concave mantle, the product comes with an extended 30% life. The QM-series cone crushers deliver lesser fines and consume lesser power per ton.
"The Indian plant owners are looking for optimized operations, wherein the existing cone crushers can be altered to produce manufactured sand. The crushing chamber can be altered by changing the conclave and mantle. This will reduce the gap between the concaves and the improved production of fine aggregates," says Mr. Kumar.
For less breakage of steel parts, Propel's grizzly feeders are made of wear resistant steel plates. This enables the feeders to bear the impact of boulders from the rigid dump trucks. The feeders do not run on gear boxes but on vibrating motors. This minimizes the possibility of oil leakages. Recent improvisations have been carried in the screens as well. Instead of welding, the screens are hug bolts fastened. The bolts are pre-stressed. The screens are equipped with four bearings which ensure that both sides of the bearings can vibrate separately. This consequently reduces stress on the units, and resultantly extends the equipment's life.
To make the crushers cost competitive with right quality control, Propel's new plant is completely equipped with fabrication and plasma cutting machine. The factory has in place computerized numerical controls machining units, paint shop, and testing facilities. Settings of the bearings in the jaw crushers are done with the CNC machines. Propel has a completely backward integrated unit and certain critical components for the crushers are manufactured at Opel factory, while certain casting materials are outsourced.
Business of Propel has consecutively grown by sixty percent in last three years consecutively. The growth was contributed by existing and new customers. According to Mr. Kumar, "the appropriate product support has enabled us to build our brand and also make existing customers loyal to us. We strongly ensure that the parts should reach our customers within 24 hours. Besides this, we have arrangements in place with some of our customers in the Eastern part of India to stock our parts in their premises. In case of emergency, we also airlift parts for our customers. To ensure that our plants deliver higher availability, operator's training is given by us in every six months. This enables them to carry out right preventive maintenance of the equipment".
Propel is looking towards dealer development and setting up of a dedicated service team to support the products in the Middle East market. It has recently commissioned a two-stage plant comprising Jaw, Cone and Screens for International Quarry Crushing, Oman. The plant is producing aggregates for road projects in Qatar. Already received repeat orders for one more plant.
Propel is gaining business through the sales of its crushing and screening plants. However, one of the major segments contributing to the kitty is washing plants to produce manufactured sand. According to Mr. Doriaswamy, Vice President-Propel Industries, "With strict ban being enforced by large number of Indian states on Mining River sand, demand for manufactured sand is rising. Currently, many plant owners are demanding 2-3 stages plants to produce manufactured sand to encash the demand. The trend is well likely to gain ground."
Propel launched its washing plants for producing manufactured sand during last Excon 2015. They manufacture sand washer with dewatering screen, 'Pro Wash' and 'Ecowash' involving the wet process besides making Pro Air Classifier for producing sand through the dry process.
NBM&CW May 2016
