What to send an engineer before asking for a quote

The difference between a quotation that can be relied on and one that will be revised three times is almost always the information it was based on. This is the list we would like to receive with any enquiry for a conveyor, a silo, a transfer point or a study. Nobody has all twelve items on the first day; the point is to know which ones are missing, because that is where the engineering starts.

The twelve items

Tick what you have. Each item says why it matters, so that the ones you cannot tick are easy to explain rather than easy to skip. The list is the same one that appears on our contact page, and it can be printed from the button at the end.

• Material and gradeThe name is not enough: "limestone" covers filler dust and 200 mm rock. The grade, the source and what the process does to it before it reaches us fix the family of equipment we are looking at.
• Bulk densityLoose and, if you have it, packed. Conveyors carry volume; the process counts mass. The density of the material as handled — wet, aerated or compacted — converts one into the other and sizes everything.
• Particle sizeThe distribution and the top size, with how often the largest lumps occur. Belt width, chute openings, elevator buckets and screw diameters are all limited by the lump, not the average.
• Moisture and temperatureAcross the seasons and including upset conditions. Moisture decides whether material sticks, bridges and cakes; temperature decides belt covers, bearings, seals and whether a belt is possible at all.
• Capacity in tonnes per hourThe nominal rate, the peak rate and how long the peak lasts. A truck tipping into a hopper is a very different duty from a steady feed of the same daily tonnage.
• Operating hoursHours per day and days per year. They set wear allowances, maintenance windows, and whether one heavy line or two lighter ones makes sense.
• Route and liftWhere the material starts, where it must end, and the levels of both. A sketch with heights is enough; it tells us whether the answer is a belt, a belt plus an elevator, or something else.
• Site plan or photographsA plan of the area — even a marked-up aerial image — and photographs of the start point, the end point and anything in between. Photographs answer questions we would not know to ask.
• Existing equipmentWhat is there now, what must stay, what can go. Make, capacity and condition of anything the new equipment connects to, and whether the existing steel can be reused.
• Dust and environmentIndoor or outdoor, wind and rain, dust limits at the fence, hazardous classification of the material, noise constraints, and whether extraction exists nearby.
• Power and utilitiesThe electrical supply available (voltage, capacity), the control system the equipment must talk to, compressed air and water if relevant.
• Target dateWhen the equipment has to run, and the shutdown windows available for installation. The date shapes the proposal as much as the tonnage does.

What if half of the list is blank?

Then send the half you have and say which half is missing. An enquiry that lists its unknowns gets a proposal with margins in the right places and, where the unknowns are decisive — flow behaviour, top size, the state of the existing steel — a proposal to resolve them first. That is often a short feasibility study or a site visit, and it is cheaper than the first change order on equipment sized on a guess.

Why does the material data come first?

Because it decides the design before any drawing exists. The note on bulk density, angle of repose and flowability explains what each property drives; the specification guide shows where each item fits in the sequence of decisions. If the material has ever bridged in a hopper or stuck in a chute, say so — that history is worth more than most laboratory data.

What will you get back?

• A written understanding of the duty as we read it, so that misunderstandings surface before the price does.
• The type of equipment proposed and why, with the alternatives considered.
• A concept arrangement where the route allows one, or a list of what has to be settled before it can be drawn — see how a project runs from enquiry to commissioning.
• The assumptions made where the data ran out, listed so they can be corrected.
• The scope boundary: what is included, what the plant provides, what remains to be checked (structure, electrical, permits).

This is the way our design and engineering work begins, whatever the project ends up being.