AHMED MOUSSA, LEADING BRICK MANUFACTURER IN NORTHERN MOROCCO

Located in Tetouan, AMINA BRIQUE has become the most important red brick factory in one of the fastest growing regions in Morocco.

This plant is the new project of Mr. Ahmed Moussa, who with more than 25 years of experience already had other two benchmark plants in the Moroccan market for the high quality of their products, such as CERÁMICA LA PALOMA (year 1993) with production capacity of 150 tons / day and CERÁMICA DE TETUÁN (year 2004) with a capacity of 700 tons / day. Both factories were assembled entirely by our representative in the country, FRAPASA.

Launched in 2017, AMINA BRIQUE has a workforce of 60 employees and a production capacity of 800-1000 tons / day of different formats of ceramic blocks.

In order to achieve such a large production capacity, they opted for the use of large extrusion Dies with a high number of exits. Being aware of the complexity involved in its manufacture, Ahmed Moussa put his trust in the know-how of MORTE, and in the long-standing experience of FRAPASA, which was again in charge of the complete assembly of the clay preparation and extrusion line; making us both their industrial partners for this project.

The first decision was to determine what would be the main products to be extruded for the start-up of the plant. The chosen products were the 12×7 hollow brick with 18 exits, the 15×12 hollow brick with 12 exits, the 20×7 hollow brick with 15 exits and the 33×7 large format with 9 exits.

The truth is that the design and manufacture of the Dies used for the extrusion of these main products was a challenge for MORTE, due to its exorbitant size and its high number of exits, unusual in today’s ceramic scene.

For this reason, it was decided to manufacture Dies model TM-EF in treated steel as a first step. That is, special modular Dies with a row of external brakes to correctly control the clay flow, and in a material that could be modified if necessary, an essential factor for the implementation of new products whose regulation can be complex.

The importance of MORTE’s TAS (Technical Assistance Service) must be emphasized throughout the process, which, in close collaboration with FRAPASA, moved to Morocco to carry out with AMINA BRIQUE workers the start-up in the factory. During this process, the necessary adjustments were made to ensure optimal operation of the Dies and that the extruded products were correct.

Once this process was successfully completed, the elements of the Die more exposed to wear, cores and frames, were replaced by others made of MOR-05 tungsten carbide, a material that has the best wear-resistance and  the best profitability of the market.

The behavior of this material was as expected, managing to maintain the weights and dimensions of the extruded products for months, favoring the stabilization of the production of the plant.

To conclude, we would like to praise the innovative spirit of Ahmed Moussa, reflected in the intention of gradually incorporating new products based on the needs and possible trends of the Moroccan market. A clear example of this is the Block type “Termoarcilla of 24” which is being extruded at AMINA BRIQUE since 2019.