Clay preperation, the Wet Pan Mills

We now begin the process of grinding the clay that was fed into the box-feeder from yesterday, from that box-feeder the clay passes to these Wet Pan Mills, which crush the clay on what we call Dead plates and then is forced through grids.
While this is happening water is added in the Pan Mill and the crushing action forces the water into the clay particles, as I have said Clay and water tend not to want to mix which is contrary to what you all think. It is very difficult to get the water into the clay so this process is key to getting the consistency correct so that it can be worked and molded.

From here the clay passes though via a conveyor to the High Speed Differential rollers which you will see tomorrow.

The pan mill has a thoughput of around 25 tonnes per hour, this is a small one our Pan Mill has a throughput of 60 tonnes per hour, and the very large ones go up to 150 tonnes per hour.