CE 417 Construction Engineering and Management Spring Semester 2011

Term Project Scraper Production Rate and Cost

Presented by: Nelson Francisco Salgado

Instructor: Dr. Waheed Uddin

May 6, 2011.

"I pledge myself to uphold the highest standards of honesty in my university life and I will not tolerate dishonesty on the part of others.

May 6, 2011.

Dr. Waheed Uddin, Professor and Director, CAIT, Department of Civil Engineering, 203 Carrier Hall, University of Mississippi, Oxford, MS.

Dear Dr. Uddin,

By this mean, I am submitting to you the final term project for the course CE417 Construction Engineering and Management, due on May 6, 2011. This report has been entitled Scraper Production Rate and Cost. The main purpose of this document is to discuss the use of scrapers in earthwork, presenting a case of study, which shows a scraper Caterpillar model 631E. Data and calculations to find its production rate and cost has been presented and discussed throughout the content of this document. Along these calculations, a section with proper discussions about the results has been included, providing some recommendations related to this project. Your evaluation and comments on this report will be greatly appreciated.

Sincerely,

Nelson Francisco Salgado, Exchange Student, University of Mississippi, Oxford, Mississippi. nfsalgad@olemiss.edu

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TABLE OF CONTENTS Page 1. Executive Summary ... 5 2. Introduction. 6 3. Data and Design Information.. 8 3.1 Data Description... 3.2 Additional Information. 4. Analysis and Design... 8 11 11

4.1 Weight................................................................... 11 4.2 Rolling Resistance 12

4.3 Grade Resistance... 12 4.4 Total Resistance, Travel Speed and Travel Time. 4.5 Dump Time... 12 14

4.6 Turning Times... 14 4.7 Total Cycle Time.. 4.8 Pusher Cycle Time 14 15

4.9 Balance Fleet. 15 4.10 Efficiency 15

4.11 Production Rate... 15 4.12 Cost. 4.13 Number of Work Time To Accomplish a Task.. 5. Evaluation of Design and Discussion of Results.... 5.1 Summary of Results.. 16 18 19 19

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5.2 Discussion of Results 19 6. Recommendations... 20 Works Cited (References)... 22

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1. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Earthwork is a very important part of a project, involving a considerable percentage of its total cost. The Transportation Research Board Executive Committee argues that good earthwork is most easily ensured by firm control operations early in the contract when many seemingly more important operations also require attention (Muri et.al, 26). For this particular project involving earthwork, it has been considered to use a scraper model Caterpillar 631E, with a single powered axle. The basic approach consists in determining the scraper cycle and its production cost in a dollars-per-cubic-yard basis through a systematic analysis. For the calculation of its cycle time, and therefore its production rate, some other considerations have taken into account. A short distance with a lowered speed fixed in five miles per hour, has been used to consider the effect of both acceleration and deceleration experimented by the scraper when coming out of the pit (cut), approaching the dump area, leaving the dump area, and again when entering the pit (Peurifoy et.al, 233). Since the scraper will be loaded at its entire volumetric capacity, it has been considered to provide assistance to the machine through the use of a push tractor in order to minimize the loading time as much as possible. In the second part of the project, a different type of soil with a different swell factor has been considered to be hauled and dumped in an area of terrain with a fixed average-fill depth. In this case, it is asked to find the number of days that the fleet of scrapers will take to accomplish the task of transporting the material to fill this volume. The final goal of the project is to find the most economic and efficient alternative in terms of the number of scrapers to be used per push tractor.

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2. INTRODUCTION Scrapers are a very useful type of construction machinery in the development of several different kinds of projects. For instance, for highway construction, some typical applications of scraper units are earthmoving operations, transporting, dumping, and spreading earth material (Wright, 481). In the sixth edition of his work called Highway Engineering, Wright argues that in a large-scale operation involving borrow pits where the borrow material is to be incorporated into embankment, scrapers show a very efficient performance when the material is different than rock (487). Push-loaded scrapers are loaded by one, two, or rarely three crawler tractors. The use of three tractors is justified when this third one is a tractor-ripper equipped with a bulldozer. Otherwise ripping is completed for the time being and the operator is simply and efficiently keeping the machine busy (Church, 13-38). This assumption has been taken for the earthwork scenario shown in this paper, therefore, only one push tractor will be used to match the number of scrapers. Besides the number of tractors to match the number of scrapers, scraper loading time depends of other variables, such as the size and characteristics of the scraper, grade resistance, conditions of the loading area, if the operator is skilled enough to operate the machine, push tractor horsepower, or nature of material (Church, 13.41). Table 1 shows different loading times for wheels-tires scrapers according to the nature of the material.

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Table 1. Loading Times for Wheels-Tires Scrapers According to Nature of Rock-Earth.

Nature of Rock-earth

Gravel-sand alluvia Residuals, silts and clays Average-weathered rock, ripped Rock well blasted

Loading time, min Push-loaded scraper Self loaded, Single-axle All-axle single-axle drive drive drive scraper 0.8 0.7 1.2 0.6 0.5 1.0 0.8 1.2 0.7 1.1 1.2 Not recommended

Source: Excavation Handbook. McGraw-Hill Inc., 1981, New York. H. Church, 13-43, Table 13-15.

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Another factor with significant influence on the loading time is the haul distance, which is related to this in a directly proportional way, meaning that at greater haul distances, loading time will increase (Peurifoy et al, 240). An average of 0.85 minutes has been used for the calculations about to be presented. The purpose of this paper is to show the entire process for computing both production rate and number of scrapers to be used in earthwork, addressing the problem to find the ideal amount of machines to afford the project to be as economical as possible. The data and design information are described next.

3. DATA AND DESING INFORMATION

3.1 Data Description The following information has been extracted from the seventh edition of the book Construction Planning, Equipment, and Methods by Robert L. Peurifoy, Clifford J. Schexnayder, and Aviad Shapira (which will be referred as the course textbook henceforth in this document). This specific extract can be found on page 251, problem 8.9: Based on the scraper specifications in table 8.1 and the performance charts in figures 8.9 and 8.10, and for haul conditions as stated here, analyze the probable scraper production. How many scrapers should be used and what will be the production in bank cubic yard per hour (bcy per hr)? The material to be hauled is cohesive.

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It has a swell factor of 0.76 and a unit weight of 2,900 pounds per bank cubic yard (lb/bcy).

The expected rolling resistance for the well-maintained haul road is +3%. Assume a 0.80 minutes (min) load time and that average load will be 90% of heaped capacity.

To account both acceleration and deceleration use an average speed of 5 miles per hour (mph) over a distance of 200 feet (ft).

Use a 50-min hour efficiency factor. The total length of haul is 2,600 ft and has individual segments (see figure 1) when moving from cut to fill.

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Figure 1. Haul road profile showing the grades for each individual segment.

400ft 200ft

1,800ft 200ft

+5% Cut

-2% -4% Fill

Source: Construction Planning Equipment and Methods, 7 ed., Peurifoy et al., 251.

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3.2 Additional Information Find the production cost using the results provided by the previous information using the following cost data: Scraper operating and ownership (O&O) cost = $89.00 per hour Push tractor O&O cost = $105.00 per hour Scrapper operator cost = $12.00 per hour Push tractor operator cost = $20.00 per hour

Find how many 6-hour days will be required to complete a site development project that requires an average 2-ft fill for 500 ft x 900 ft area? Assume 1.0 swell factor.

4. ANALYISIS AND DESIGN

4.1 Weight The following specifications for a scraper model Caterpillar 631E has been extracted from table 8.1 on page 232 of the course textbook: Heaped capacity = 31 cubic yards (cy) Operating weight = 96,880 lb

Empty Weight (EVW) Load Volume = 0.9 x 31cy = 27.9 (loose cubic yards) Lcy Load volume bank measure 27.9 x 0.76 = 21.2 bcy Weight of load = 21.2 bcy x 2,900 lb/bcy = Gross Weight (GVW)

96,880 lb

61,480 lb 158,360 lb

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4.2 Rolling Resistance (RR) From data of the problem: RR = +3%

4.3 Grade Resistance (GR) From data of the problem: 600 ft 1,800 ft 200ft +5% -2% -4%

4.4 Total Resistance, Travel Speed, Travel Time The calculation of total resistance, and travel time is shown on table 2 of this paper. To compute the total resistance, it has been use the following equation:

where TR: Total resistance GR: Grade resistance RR: Rolling resistance To compute the travel time, it has been use the equation 8.2 on page 238 of the course textbook, described as following:

The travel speed for the first and last segment has been fixed in 5mph in order to account of the acceleration and deceleration. For the rest of haul segments, speed has been extracted from figure 8.9 of the course textbook. Salgado 12

Table 2. Calculation of Travel Time

Distance RR (%) (ft) 200 400 1800 200 200 1800 400 200 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3

GR (%) 5 5 -2 -4 4 2 -5 -5

TR TR (%) (Lb/ton) 160 160 20 -20 140 100 -40 -40 8 8 1 -1

Speed (mph) 5 11 33.5 5

Travel Time (min)

Haul(164,450Lb)

0.45 0.41 0.61 0.45 0.45 1.20 0.14 0.45 4.18

Return (96,880Lb)

7 5 5 17 -2 33.5 -2 5 Total Travel Time

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4.5 Dump Time Dump time for scrapers depends on the machine size and project conditions. The machine considered in this case has a heaped capacity of 27cy. Its dump time has been obtained from table 8.7 on page 341 of the course textbook: Dump time = 0.37

4.6 Turning Times It is argued on the course textbook by its authors that turning time is not significantly affected by either type or size of scraper (Peurifoy et al, 242). For this project, the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) provisions have been used fixing the turning time values as following: Turn time fill = 0.21 min Turn time cut = 0.30 min

4.7 Total Cycle Time The total cycle time is the summation of the travel time, load time, dump time and turn times of the scraper. Travel Time Load Time Dum Time Turn Time fill Turn Time Cut Total Cycle Time 4.18 min 0.80 0.37 0.21 0.30 5.86 min

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4.8 Pusher Cycle Time For computing the pusher cycle time, it has been used equation 8.3 on page 243 of the course textbook, described as follows:

4.9 Balance Fleet For computing the number of scrapers per push tractor to be used in the project, it has been necessary to make the calculations with the equation 8.4 shown on page 245 of the course textbook, described as follows:

4.10 Efficiency The efficiency of the machine used in this project has been established on a value of 50 min-hr based on the provided data.

4.11 Production Rate In this case, it is possible to choose among two alternatives, 4 or 5 scrapers. If 4 scrapers are selected, the production rate should be obtained through equation 8.5 on page 246 of the course textbook, because 4 is less than the balanced number of scrapers 4.28.

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If 5 scrapers are selected, the production rate is controlled by the pusher tractor because 5 is greater than the balanced number of scrapers 4.32. The production rate for this scenario can be obtained through equation 8.6 on page 246 of the course textbook, described as follows.

4.12 Cost Table 3 of this document shows de calculation for the unit cost in dollar-per-hour basis for the different two alternatives: using four or five scrapers. Unit cost per item has been extracted from the additional data.

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Table 3. Cost Calculation 4 Scrapers 5 Scrapers Total QuanQuan- Total Cost Cost ($/hr) tity tity ($/hr) 4 356.00 5 445.00 4 48.00 5 60.00 1 105.00 1 105.00 1 20.00 1 20.00 529.00 630.00

Unit Cost ($/hr) Scrapers Push Tractor O&O cost Operator cost O&O cost Operator cost 89.00 12.00 105.00 20

Note: To compute the unit cost in dollars-bank-cubic-yard units, the following equation has been used:

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4.13 : Number of Work Days to Accomplish a Task In this part of the project, it is asked to find the number of six-hour days that the machine will take to fill a volume with a material presenting a 1.0 swell factor. This means that no conversion is needed in the previously estimated production rate. Having discussed this, the volume-to-be-filled calculation is presented as following:

Given that the swell factor is now to be assumed 1.0, this fill volume presents the same value in bank cubic yards. The rest of calculations are shown on table 5 of this paper.

Table 4. Number of Six-hour Days Calculation 5 Scrapers Quantity Unit 21.2 bcy 1.37 min 5.86 min 773.7 bcy/hr 33333.3 bcy 7.18 days 8 days 4 Scrapers Quantity Unit 21.2 bcy 1.37 min 5.86 min 723.5 bcy/hr 33333.3 bcy 7.68 days 8 days

Load Bank Measure Pusher Cycle Time Scraper Cycle Time Production Rate Volume to be filled Number of 6-hour days Rounded number of 6-hour days

Note: To compute the production rate, equation 8.5 when using 4 scrapers, and equation 8.6 when using 5 scrapers. Both equations are shown on page 246 of the course textbook and have been retyped in this paper in section step 14 from the data and analysis. To compute the number of days, the following equation has been utilized.

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EVALUATION OF DESIGN AND DISCUSSION OF RESSULTS

5.1 Summary of Results Based on the previous data and analysis, table 6 has been constructed in order to show a summary of the obtained results. It has been taken into account that the balanced number of scrapers resulted to be 4.32, opening the possibility of choosing either four or five machines.

Table 6. Summary of Results 4 Scrapers 5 Scrapers 723.5 bcy/hr 773.7 bcy/hr $529 /hr $630 /hr $0.731 /bcy $0.814 /bcy 33,333.30 cy 33,333.30 cy 7.18 days 7.68 days 8 days 8 days

Production Rate Production Cost Unit Production Cost Volume to be filled Additional data Number of 6-hour days Rounded number of 6-hour days Problem 8.5 data

5.2 Discussion of Results It is appreciable that the balanced number of scrapers is closer to 4 than 5. In the first part of this project, using 4 scrapers will generate savings up to $101/hr with the cost of reducing the production rate in 6.49% in comparison with the 773.7 bcy/hr production rate developed with 5 machines. These savings represent 10.20% less than the alternative of working with 5 pieces of equipment, and around $0.083 every cubic yard of bank volume. In the second part of the project, the additional data does not provoke significant variation on the balanced number of scrapers, meaning that the same criteria of choosing between either 4 or 5 machines also applies for this case.

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Now, time is presented as the critical variable of selection in a 6-hour daytime basis. Although both alternatives provide similar numbers resulting both in a rounded number of 8 days, working with 5 machines will provide 0.82 days (around 5 hours from a total of 6 hours in that day) of float time in the last day. Other parameters that will be considered for the final recommendation are the size of this work, which is relatively small-scale, and production rate.

5. RECOMMENDATIONS The first case, without a fixed volume to fill, does leave the cost estimator to consider several scenarios. A large-scale project may justify the use of 5 scrapers, meaning to increase costs in $101 per hour. With a higher production rate, the employment of these 5 machines should reduce the time to accomplish the task resulting in more savings. Other aspects to consider are the type of material and the type of machine to be used. In this case the material was categorized to be a cohesive soil and a push loaded scraper. In the case of a different, harder soil, another type of scraper may be considered. In his work, Church argues that soft to medium formations favor the self-loading scraper and medium to hard rock-earth favors the push-loaded machine. When several locations require excavations at the same time as in cuts for confined home sites, the self sufficient self-loading scraper is more economical (13-51). Other circumstance for large-scale projects can be to improve haul roads. Grades in the haul roads determine the travel speed of the selected piece of equipment, therefore it is important to study its effect on the production cost. Church agrees on the more moderate the grades, both unfavorable, the faster the average travel speed, adding that maximum values for the haul-road grade ranging in 8% as being conductive to economical allSalgado 20

weather operation (Church 15-5). The improvement of haul road conditions can also make the rolling resistance to decrease (Peurifoy, 315). While close attention to haul roads is characteristic of large works it tends to be neglected in planning for small rock-earth excavations (Church, 15-20). In the second part of this project, a relatively small volume was considered to be filled using a fleet of scrapers and a push tractor. In this case, the difference between the two alternatives (either four or five scrapers) becomes more noticeable due to the scale of this work. Though with both number of scrapers the number of days to accomplish the task turn out to be the same, it is demonstrated than using 5 machines, we are likely to have a 0.82-day float time. Using 4 scrapers, the balanced number of days is almost exactly 8 days, without leaving much float time. Since no more tasks are mentioned to be completed by the fleet of scrapers, it is more recommendable to use only 4 scrapers. Selecting this alternative would generate savings up to one hundred dollars, and only for this second case, the cost related to improve haul roads may not be justified based on the size of the earthwork.

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Works Cited Church, Horace. Excavation Handbook. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1981. Print. Muri, Wayne et al. Guide to Earthwork Construction. Washington: Transportation Research Board National Research Council, 1990. Print. Peurifoy, Robert et al. Construction Planning, Equipment and Methods. 7th. ed. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2006. Print Wright, Paul. Highway Engineering. 6th. ed. New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1996. Print.

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