The cement mortar mixing is one of the difficult activities which mason assistants are manually doing in rural areas which often leads to wastage of materials including cement, poor quality of mortar due to lack of uniformity in mixing and health hazards to workers. In addition it is time consuming and needs more than one worker.
The components of the machine are (a) Rotating drum with mixing blades is the key component of the machine. The mortar mixing operation is carried out inside the drum. The mixing blades provided within the drum create a shovelling effect which ensures proper mixing. The drum is mounted on the main shaft with thrust bearings. (b) Unloading Mechanism is essentially a swivelling mechanism with unloading handle & clutch provided with the drum. When the clutch lever is pressed, the drum lock disengages, which enables tilting of the drum downwards. Tension springs provided with the unloading mechanism prevents sudden tilting of the drum. Only a small amount of manual support is required while unloading. (c) Bevel Gear Drive provides mechanical advantage for easy operation. Bevel gear having 40 teeth mounted on the periphery of rotating drum and driving pinion having 10 teeth with rotating lever constitutes the gear drive. The gear ratio thus obtained is 4:1, i.e. the drum completes one revolution while the rotating handle rotates four times. Mobility of the machine is facilitated by three castor wheels provided at the frame.
The required cement, sand and water are fed in the drum and are rotated with the rotating lever until the material is mixed in the needed form. After mixing, the clutch is disengaged and the unloading lever is tilted downwards for collecting mortar from the drum. This can be operated by a single person. The capacity of the mixer is 7 pans of Mortar. However drums of larger capacities can be fixed if needed.
Cost of Technology: Rs.20,000/-