ZOOMLINE Signs ZAM-8 Bitumen Melting Plant Order with Top Road Contractor in Zimbabwe
Country: Zimbabwe
Date: June 2026
Product: 8t/h asphalt drum unloading equipment
Model: ZAM-8
Partnership Background: Deepening Presence in Zimbabwe’s Road Construction Market
In June 2026, Henan ZOOMLINE formally sealed a cooperation agreement with a well-established local general road contractor in Zimbabwe for the procurement of the ZAM-8 8TPH bitumen melting machine.
With over a decade of experience in Zimbabwe’s road construction sector, this client undertakes numerous key government infrastructure projects including the expansion of Harare-Beitbridge Highway and the renovation of provincial rural road networks. It ranks among the largest private engineering contractors specializing in national highway upgrading and urban-rural road reconstruction across the country.
Currently, the Zimbabwean government is pressing ahead with Phase II of the National Emergency Road Rehabilitation Programme. The country boasts a total highway mileage of nearly 98,000 kilometers, yet merely 20% of pavements remain in sound condition. The annual funding shortfall for road maintenance exceeds USD 350 million, leaving a vast number of aged, damaged arterial roads and rural branch lines in urgent need of asphalt resurfacing. Consequently, demand for pre-processing equipment for barreled bitumen (bitumen drum decanters) keeps surging. The client purchased the ZAM-8 bitumen drum decanter primarily to melt and dehydrate barreled asphalt for its scattered pavement renovation projects, bridging the capacity gap in the front-end asphalt mixing process, supporting simultaneous construction on multiple arterial highways and stabilizing the supply efficiency of asphalt raw materials.
Client Pain Points: Operational Bottlenecks Under Parallel Construction Schedules
Engaged in multi-site parallel construction year-round, the contractor has long been plagued by a host of operational pain points:
Space Constraints and Dispersed Sites
Its construction sites are widely dispersed with long distances between work zones, and temporary mixing stations feature limited space. Traditional large-scale bitumen decanter occupy extensive land and involve cumbersome relocation, making them incompatible with fragmented construction yards.
Severe Capacity Shortage
Its outdated bitumen decanter deliver a capacity of less than 5 tons per hour. When multiple projects kick off simultaneously, asphalt supply fails to keep up with paving schedules, causing frequent shutdowns due to raw material shortages and severely delaying construction progress.
Environmental Regulations and Purity Issues
Environmental regulations in Zimbabwe are growing increasingly stringent. Old open-type bitumen boilers discharge flue gas and asphalt volatiles directly, making it difficult to pass local environmental inspections. Meanwhile, local construction standards impose higher requirements on asphalt purity, whereas legacy equipment leaves substantial asphalt residues and impurities inside drums, compromising pavement quality.
Product Highlights: ZAM-8 Bitumen Melting Machine with Eco-Friendly & Energy-Saving
Faced with these overlapping challenges, the client selected the ZAM-8 asphalt drum melter, Henan ZOOMLINE flagship model tailor-made for medium and small road projects across Africa, distinguished by outstanding core performance:
High-Efficiency Capacity
The bitumen melting equipment maintains a stable rated capacity of 8 tons per hour, fully meeting the raw material demand for concurrent road construction.
Energy-Saving Temperature Control
Adopting a four-layer closed-loop thermal conductive oil heating structure paired with a waste heat recovery system for exhaust gas, the unit achieves a thermal efficiency above 85% while cutting energy consumption by 20% compared with conventional equipment. Its temperature control accuracy reaches ±2°C, preventing local asphalt coking under high temperature and securing stable physical and chemical properties of finished asphalt.
Green & Eco-Friendly
The whole machine adopts an integrated fully enclosed container structure equipped with an internal flue gas purification and collection system to eliminate asphalt volatile leakage, fully complying with Zimbabwe’s current environmental construction standards.
Highly Automated Operation
Fitted with an automatic hydraulic drum tipping mechanism, it eliminates manual hoisting and flipping of asphalt barrels, with each barrel feeding operation completed within 30 seconds. Built-in automatic slag removal and internal asphalt circulation dehydration modules boost asphalt extraction rate from drums to over 99%, drastically cutting raw material waste.
Extreme Portability
The highly integrated unit requires no disassembly of large components for shipment in a single container, and reassembly and relocation take only half a day, perfectly suiting the client’s scattered multi-site construction amid space constraints.
Customized Services: Localization Upgrades Tailored for Harsh African Conditions
After horizontal comparisons among global road construction machinery manufacturers and on-site prototype testing, the client ultimately selected ZAM-8 model of Henan ZOOMLINE. The client stated that European and American equipment of equivalent specifications comes with exorbitant prices and lengthy spare parts lead times, while some domestic alternatives of bitumen melting machine lack sufficient adaptability to balance limited site space and local environmental standards.
Drawing on years of experience serving African markets, Henan ZOOMLINE implemented customized optimizations tailored to Zimbabwe’s regional characteristics including arid, dusty weather, severe voltage fluctuations and scattered construction yards:
Upgraded dust-proof sealing assemblies for open-air construction;
Revised electric control systems to match the local 415V/50Hz power supply standard;
Simplified structures of vulnerable parts and adopted universal components easily accessible across Africa;
Optimized the modular layout of the whole unit to reduce floor space and enable rapid disassembly and relocation.
Delivery & After-Sales: Full-Process One-Stop Cross-Border Logistics and Support
To guarantee on-time delivery and smooth commissioning of the equipment, Henan ZOOMLINE provides a full-process one-stop delivery service:
Rigorous Factory Inspections
Three rounds of factory inspection are implemented throughout production, covering tightness testing of the thermal oil system, an 8-hour continuous full-load capacity trial run, and verification of environmental emission indicators. A complete set of Chinese-English inspection reports are provided alongside the unit.
Inter-modal Logistics
Once fully packaged, the bitumen machine is transported via inland intermodal transport to the port, followed by dedicated container sea freight straight to Beira Port, Zimbabwe, with fully controllable logistics cycles.
Overseas Technical Assistance
Upon arrival at the destination, our overseas technical team provides on-site guidance covering unloading, whole-unit assembly, pipeline connection and electrical commissioning, alongside hands-on training for local operators.
Long-Term Warranty
A 12-month full machine warranty and 24/7 online remote technical support are offered post-delivery to resolve the client’s worries over overseas equipment operation and maintenance.
Win-Win Cooperation: Furthering Infrastructure Development Footprints in Africa
The signing of the ZAM-8 bitumen decanter order delivers mutual value enhancement for both supplier and client. For the Zimbabwean contractor, this energy-efficient, locally-adapted bitumen decanter fills the gap in asphalt pre-processing capacity, slashing construction energy use and raw material loss, enabling it to efficiently secure government road reconstruction contracts and elevate project delivery efficiency and market competitiveness.
For Henan ZOOMLINE, this cooperation further consolidates its brand reputation in Zimbabwe’s and Southeast Africa’s road construction equipment market. At present, Henan ZOOMLINE bitumen drum decanter, bitumen bag decanter and asphalt mixing plants have been sold in bulk to numerous African countries including Zimbabwe, the Republic of the Congo, Kenya and South Africa. Leveraging robust Chinese manufacturing equipment strength, ZOOMLINE will continue to advance road infrastructure upgrading across African nations.
