Sioux City Brick & Tile - We Make Great Brick
Adel, Iowa


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Adel Rhythm Blending Machine - a real WIN-WIN innovation for both our Customers and Sioux City Brick

RBM Design Features…

  • Provide for Blending between 2 fired colors (from 2 separate kiln cars)
  • Provide for "better than hand" blending of flashed colors
  • Be able to save and easily recall the packaging programs for 10 different Brick Sizes
  • Provide for "desticking" slightly stuck together brick (Sand-Struck Series)
  • Be able to handle All-faced, All-Faces-up, or Program-faced settings
  • Packages to have paper every row with the top row facing down
  • Provide for single-high, all-faces-up, spaced-out-inspection of all brick
  • Packages to have an automatically applied LOGO sheet covering headers on the forklift end of pkg. with a package label to be applied over it and held in place by the cross-strap
  • Machine Rate to be able to package the Plant Capacity in 7.5 hrs/day for a 5 day week.

    Heavy Duty Crane Unloader Moves 4 packs at a time from
    each of 2 kiln cars to Robot slat conveyors

    This is quite an operation to watch with all these customer friendly features going on simultaneously. It's taken a dedicated effort by Ceric and our crew to bring this to fruition - over an 18 month period. The overall operation relies on the brick coming to the RBM standing straight and with excellent quality - the making room, dryer, and kiln have been performing very well in this regard.





    Crane moves 4 packs at a time from either of 2 kiln cars to 1 of 3 slat conveyors which feed the Robots.




    3 industrial robots can grip from beds or ends (note the holding gripper which holds the row immediately under the double layer which the robot grips). This effectively desticks the brick.


    After the robot grips 2 layers it segregates the brick into two groups. If the color is flashed then only the top two darker sets go down the left side to assure that the darker colors are blended in slowly and evenly. If the color is a straight range then the robot sets an equal number on each chain conveyor.



    The brick advance down the chains to the faces-up station which turns all the faces up so that during the inspection phase later in the RBM the people will be able to inspect all the face sides. The brick then advance to the Rhythm Blending station.

    THE RHYTHM BLENDING STATION IS A LONG SLAT CONVEYOR WHERE THE BRICK ARE BLENDED - YOU CAN SEE HOW THE BLEND IS ACCUMULATED AS THE CONVEYOR INDEXES TO EACH STATION.



    There are six (6) blending stations. Each station adds 1-3 brick depending on the Brick size and whether it is a flashed brick or a clearburn color. The finished blend is better than can be achieved by hand blending.


    After the Blending Process is complete the brick are conveyed down to the Push-off station where the brick are pushed off the conveyor and then they are destacked and arranged only one-high on the next chain conveyor in preparation for the inspection station (see the destacking gripper on the left).

    The Inspection Area is where the "Human Touch" is added.



    All the brick get "spaced out" side-to-side and end-to-end so that they can be properly judged. The general quality of the brick has been excellent so that only three people are normally needed in the inspection area although up to six can be accommodated if necessary.



    After inspection the brick proceed to the Paper Station where paper is applied to each row (see the paper rolls in the above photo).


    In the process the brick are stacked two (2) high again in preparation for the package building area. It is important to note that the top row is always turned faced down in the package for protection.


    The main strapping station is equipped with two (2) polyester strap tensioning heads (at the right) and the normal application of corner-protection plastic. The neat feature of this area is the automatic application of the end cover sheet and package label to the left side of the photo which are secured by the cross-strap.


    The fork-lift end package cover sheet (with LOGO) is applied at left with the package label (with LOGO) being put on in the center and the cross-strap compression station at the right secures both.

    A WIN-WIN SITUATION.




    The end result is a package and a product that both our Customer and Sioux City Brick can be proud of.

    Optional Stretch-wrapping adds that nice package integrity feature:



    Railcar loading requires stretch wrapping and it can be done in singles or doubles - with or without the top cover sheet. Available as an option for truck shipments, it costs $5./mbe in doubles and $7./mbe in singles (add $1./m for the top cover on either). It comes standard on Birchwoods.

    HOW SWEET IT IS!