49 / 76
May 2015
MODERN MINING
47
CRUSHING, SCREENING
AND MILLING
feature
The CS cone crusher, part of
the crusher range available
from Aury Africa.
inspection services to the minerals industry.
Immediately prior to founding Aury Africa,
he was GM of Ludowici Africa (now part of
FLSmidth). Both these positions saw him trav-
elling extensively in Africa and while with
AHK he was based in Zambia for several years.
Aury Africa’s consumables range includes
woven wire and modular wedge wire screen
panels, centrifuge baskets and components,
modular polyurethane screen surfaces and sys-
tems, as well as wear pipe and pipe linings.
The company supplies from its headquarters in
Jet Park, Johannesburg, where it has a 5 000 m
2
facility, but also has branches in Durban and
Cape Town. Part of the consumables range is
manufactured locally and last year Aury Africa
commissioned two looms (representing a
R1 million investment) at the Jet Park premises
dedicated to producing woven wire screens.
The larger of the two looms is capable of manu-
facturing screens up to 3 m wide and 20 m long.
When Aury Africa first started trading, it
was importing the woven wire screens from
China. The downside, however, was that there
was a three-month turnaround time on orders.
“Since we started local production, this lead
time has been reduced to two weeks,” says
Houchin. He adds that the target, now almost
achieved, is to produce 1 000 units a month
from the Jet Park facility.
The success of the consumables business
means that Aury Africa is now ready to put
increased focus on selling capital equipment.
“Currently, capital equipment sales only
account for about 10 % of our turnover. We’re
not unhappy with this as our strategy from the
outset was to build up the consumables busi-
ness first. But with this essential groundwork
having been done, the time is now ripe for
Aury Africa to expand its equipment business,”
states Houchin.
Sales of vibrating screens were constrained
until recently by a mismatch between the
products available from Aury in China and
the needs of the local market. “The primary
requirement in China is for large screens, typi-
cally in the 3,6 m to 4,9 m wide range,” notes
Houchin. “This is very wide for the South
African market where the main demand is for a
2,4 m screen. To supply us, Aury (Tianjin) sim-
ply took its standard 3,6 m screen and scaled it
down. The result was an over-engineered prod-
uct that was capable enough but too expensive
for local customers. So went back to Aury
(Tianjin) and expressed our concerns. They
listened to us and have now designed a 2,4 m
screen from the ground up. The product is per-
fect for the South African – and indeed African
– mining industry in terms of both price and
performance and our task is now to get this
message out to the local market.”
With South Africa having several very