I have been using my mates mtec m200 on a few of my domestic jobs since August spraying Parex monorex.
Its a tidy looking design with a useful on board water pump, but unlike my ritmo, requires an additional external air compressor.
I was interested to see if the m200 machine lived unto the hype of "giving a G4 a run for its money"...pumping 18l/min with 25m pipe etc.
But overall I was left disappointed with it.
Firstly, It was stubborn to start... after priming the mixing chamber and carefully sprinkling the some powder to avoid splashing, we would press start and the machine would struggle to turn. we would be hitting the 'reverse pulse' button to persuade it to pump but by then the water had backed up into the hopper.. nightmare. (Ritmo.. water in powder chucked in and off we go)
It's as if its underpowered, needs a bigger motor like the ritmo L to turn the mixing shaft. The rotor stator being brand new was clamped loose but the acted as if it was clamped up so tight it was acting as a brake.
Once we finally got action we found it struggled it top speed (4) Machine was couching and spluttering and we had to go down to speed 3 to bring the amps down and get a smooth run without tripping out the 5kva trannys.
We were told that our water setting was too low and this was causing machine issues. Now I've used many plastering machines over the years in Germany in the 90's and now here, I consider myself to be a reasonable experienced plasterer that has completed 1000's m2 of mono. So as with the Ritmo, I set the machine water to how i want the consistency of my render to be, My take on all this was if it won't spray consistently well on top speed then its no faster than a ritmo. But it should pumping on speed 4 not 3 so we weren't happy.
We moaned again so on our last job in December, we were observed for a day by the tech guy.
First thing he said was 'I'm no plasterer', I'm a plastering machine expert. So I gave him my attention.
He told me that I should 'change my rendering technique' to allow the machine to spray faster.
Sorry but i'm not about to compromise on material quality to make the machines life easier. Anyway he set it up with his own idea of what the water setting should be and of course when we sprayed it clear to see that was too wet to effectivly use. I adjusted the water to achieve a useable quality render again and we had power problems once more causing us to run on speed 3. Tech guy took lots of video that day and said he would report back. He watched us working all afternoon and conceded that speed 3 was our best option to work the way we do.
So I won't rush to change my ritmo. It seems no slower than the m200 in the end to me. I do fancy a new G4 for next year tho.
Hi Ant,
Interesting to hear this feedback. Was brought to my attention as Les from PFT Northern has shared it online.
Always good to hear both positive and negative views so we can see the differences in views.
To answer a few points that you raised;
The compressor deliberately isnt on board as we didn't want it to be. It's kept up to 25m away from the machine to firstly reduce the noise around the area, secondly to reduce the impact from dust etc affecting or blocking filters. It isn't an additional compressor - it's the only one
With regards to material in the hopper getting wet due to it being fed in. This can happen, but when you become more experienced with that particular machine and how it operates - this won't be happening. It's literally plug and go.
The coughing or spluttering also known as farting can be down to the material consistency or where the air line nozzle is situated in the gun. Something which is easy to overcome.
The machine runs perfectly on speed 1,2,3&4 but the consistency needs to be correct. The machine professional you saw who 'wasn't a plasterer' was
@Des Miller - PFT Central who is experienced in the machine world, in fact he ran PFT in the UK for a number of years and set the business or dealerships up in the U.K.
Understand you can have a view after using Adies machine, but my advise is to use it in more than a few jobs and really understand about the machine itself. To my knowledge your friend Adie who owns the machine is very happy with it, he seemed very impressed when he visited last month also.
