Aggregates Manager Digital Magazine
Issue link: https://read.dmtmag.com/i/91809
PLANT PROFILE ing plant. "We have material left over from some of our jobs that sits for a while," Jason says, "so we put it back on the conveyor with the skid steer. We also use the skid steer for clean up around the plant." The amount of asphalt made at A1 Quality varies from job to job — cold mix can be anywhere from 5,000 to 15,000 tons per year and hot mix between 5,000 and 10,000 tons per year. Members of the Aguilar family stand in front of the processing plant. (Front: Canda and Pablo Aguilar, Sr., founders of the company. Back, left to right: Paul Aguilar, Jr., son; Jason Aguilar, grandson; Steven Aguilar, son.) "We have three sons [Paul, Steven, and Chris] and one daughter [Kathleen]," says Canda Aguilar. "Two sons and our grandson, Jason, work here at the quarry. Jason runs the whole processing plant." A second grandson, John, runs the ready-mix batch plant and handles estimates. Steven manages the business, and Paul hauls materials from the quarry to the ready-mix plant and makes deliveries, as does Norman, another of Pablo and Canda's grandsons. Steven's wife, Patty, and their daughter, Meghann, manage the office. The whole family does many different jobs to help keep the business going. Other companies, like Lafarge, have come to A1 Quality looking for aggregate to use for freeway work in the area. "They work out of our pit, because we're close to the free- way," Canda says. "They know there's rock here, so they lease part of the property. The rock is called rhyolite. It's a very tough rock — very strong and hard to crush." The processing plant is pretty basic, nothing too fancy, but it's all automated. "The employee in the control tower controls everything, from the conveyors to the speed of the VSI to the speed of the material being fed. We bought a new concrete batch plant about 12 years ago, and it's all auto- mated as well. It's really nice." Depending on what jobs there are, the quarry produces anywhere from 85,000 to 125,000 tons of sand and gravel per year. "We use most of it ourselves," Jason says, "but we get contracts through the county and state for base coarse and chips. We also sell to individuals. We get a lot of small customers daily, but mostly on the weekends." Scales are located at both the processing plant and the batch plant. "Thirty years ago, people would come in, and we'd sell it by the yard," Jason says. "Now, everything is weighed." A skid-steer loader is constantly in motion at the process- AGGREGATES MANAGER November 2012 29 The company started out at the batch plant location, and so did the quarry. "There's still an old crusher at the bot- tom of the hill," Jason says. "It has been there for more than 30 years. That's where we used to get our sand and gravel. When the deposit ran out at the batch plant location, we opened up the quarry at our current location. We've been at this quarry for 12 years now. "It's a very interesting story," Jason says, of how his grand- parents built the company. "It's hard to believe how they came to be, and how they brought the company from noth- ing to where it is today." AM The original concrete batching plant was bought secondhand in the early 1970s from a lumberyard in Socorro. It was replaced with a computerized model in 2000. Equipment List Caterpillar 980G wheel loader Caterpillar D6H dozer Volvo L150F wheel loader Terex 30-ton haul truck Austin Western 32x40 jaw crusher Trio 52x24 rip rap machine Simplicity 5x16 screen Telsmith 48 S cone crusher JCI 6x20 screen Cemco 80 VSI crusher Powerscreen 1200 Chieftain Powerscreen 4x6 screen Nesco water system Volvo MC70B skid-steer loader