Fossil vextraction
24 April 2008
Separation Of 180 Million Year Old fossils from rock destined to become ballast or cement material is being made easier at a quarry in Germany through use of a new hydraulic breaker from Rammer. Quarry operator Gebrüder Gerstmeier is using a Rammer G 80 City hammer mounted on a Komatsu PC 340 excavator to pick out the ammonites from the marble at the quarry in the Jura Mountains near Munich.
Only a 1,6 m thick layer within the quarry produces material suitable for cutting, the rest is crushed for other construction uses. “The high performance combined with low noise and vibration of the G 80 hammer is ideal for processing the residual material,” said Gebrüder Gerstmeier owner Alwin Gerstmeier. “The quarry is a fossil hunter's paradise and the new hammer makes it easier to search for and separate the ammonites from the residual material.”