It started with pigs. And with the smell there.
- A pig fattening farm near Deutschlandsberg in Styria. The persistent ammonia smell was the problem — and Tihomir Lelas had responded to a tender.
The Croatian man was then working as the head of a research company in Vienna. He was familiar with zeolite — the ancient volcanic rock that had long been known as a filter and absorber. The experiment in Styria was a resounding success. The pulverized stone not only freed the barn from ammonia. "The pigs licked the stuff like crazy," Lelas later recounted. Fewer animals died in the barn. Diarrhea disappeared. Cannibalism decreased.
And he began to research.
First, a look back — what ball mills are and why they have a problem
To understand what tribomechanical activation is, one must first understand what it is not. Let's start from here.
Conventional grinding processes are carried out using ball mills. A ball mill is essentially a rotating drum filled with huge balls or discs of metal — sometimes steel, sometimes other hard alloys. The minerals are placed in the drum. The drum rotates. The balls roll over each other and over the mineral. The mineral is ground, crushed, milled — finer and finer, smaller and smaller.
For coarse applications, this works well enough. But for fine grain sizes below 50 micrometers, problems begin.
Problem 1: Metal abrasion. The balls wear out. With every collision with the hard mineral, tiny metal particles rub off the balls. This metal abrasion ends up in the ground product. Zeolite attracts metal — which is actually its strength, its adsorption capacity. But this also means that it absorbs the metal abrasion from the balls. A finely ground zeolite from a ball mill can be contaminated with heavy metals — not because the raw material was, but because the grinding process caused it. A simple magnet test shows this: dissolve zeolite in a glass of water, stir, hold a magnet to the outside of the glass — and observe what happens. With ball mill zeolite, a dark cloud is drawn to the magnet. This is the metal abrasion.
Problem 2: Destruction of crystal lattices. This is the core problem. Zeolite has a unique internal structure — a crystal lattice with tiny cavities and channels responsible for its adsorption and ion exchange capacity. When zeolite is ground in a ball mill, these crystal lattices are crushed and damaged. The balls press on the particles from the outside — the crystal lattice inside cannot withstand the pressure and collapses.
A zeolite with a destroyed crystal lattice is a zeolite that can no longer do what zeolite is known for. It is still chemically zeolite. But it no longer acts like zeolite.
This is why some claim zeolite doesn't work. They are right — incorrectly ground zeolite indeed does not work. And does not do what zeolite can.
What Tihomir Lelas did differently — tribomechanical activation
Lelas had been working on improving grinding since the 1970s. He knew ball mills and their problems. And he was looking for a way to solve these problems.
The solution was as elegant as it was radical: he replaced the iron rods and balls with transverse blades. The particles should no longer hit metal — they should hit each other. Mineral against mineral. Particle against particle.
Air currents accelerate the mineral particles to extreme speeds — until they collide at enormous velocities. On average, 3,000 collisions occur per second — at three times the speed of sound.
The machine that resulted was not a quiet laboratory device. It howled like a landing jumbo jet. The walls vibrated in the factory hall in Osijek. 40,000 revolutions per minute. Two counter-rotating rotors made of steel, diamonds, and high-quality ceramic. Dust and noise and energy. And in the end — a fine white powder that trickled out of the system. Electrically charged. Flour-soft. Completely different from anything that had come out of machines before.
Lelas' sales partners and licensees often visit us. They tell us how well he could tell stories, how he could inspire. They describe his original machine to us, which was ultra-loud and dusty. We can imagine that so well, even if it is no longer so loud and dusty with us. We can totally relate to his joy in the fineness and quality of the product.
Those who met Tihomir Lelas — and there are people in our circle who had the good fortune to meet him personally — describe a tall, enthusiastic man full of energy and ideas. A person who, with shining eyes, explained what he had discovered. Who listened when farmers and doctors reported their experiences. Who was genuinely happy when his product helped. And who gathered a group of other men around him.
'He was a wonderful man with many ideas who only wanted one thing: to help people.'
What really happens in these collisions — three crucial differences
No metal abrasion. Mineral collides with mineral — not with metal. The end product is pure. No heavy metals. No magnet test needed.
Crystal lattice remains intact. During the collision of two particles, they split along their natural crystal lattice planes — the weakest point in the mineral. The internal structure remains intact. Moreover, the crystal lattices are even more strongly activated by the activation process. The internal surface area of 1 gram of tribomechanically activated zeolite is around 10,000 square meters. This is the area where adsorption, ion exchange, and all other mechanisms of action take place.
Electrostatic charge. With each collision, the electron distribution on the particle surface changes. The particles become electrostatically charged — active, reactive, alive. This charge causes them to adhere to leaf surfaces, be drawn through leaf pores, and react immediately inside the leaf.
This is the fundamental difference between tribomechanically activated mineral and conventionally ground mineral — even if both have the same particle size.
The enthusiasm that started a movement
Tihomir Lelas was not just an inventor. He was a person who inspired others. The effect of zeolite was researched.
And so — the decisive turn. Around Lelas, a group of businessmen formed, so enthusiastic about the technology that they became active themselves. Each in his own field. Each with his own idea of how this technology could be used.
One immediately secured a raw material source — a part of the unique clinoptilolite deposit in Eastern Slovakia near Košice. The zeolite from the Carpathian belt is considered one of the purest in the world — in its original form, only available here and in Cuba in this quality, according to Prof. Dr. Karl Hecht.
Another began field trials of tribomechanically activated calcite in various crops — first in Europe, then worldwide. Grapevines, olive trees, sugar beets, wheat. The results were convincing.
And because everyone was enthusiastic about the same technology and its effect, but nobody wanted to get in each other's way, everyone gave the product their own name. The zeolite was called Megamin. The calcite was called Megagreen. One can imagine that everyone also wanted to test their strength and effect on the market. And that different opinions and strategies arose. Where there were licenses before, other names were added, such as Herbagreen. This led to new brands. The same technology. The same effect. Different names. Always tribomechanically activated zeolite, TMAZ, tribomechanically micronized activated. And tribomechanically micronized activated calcite. Patented by Mr. Lelas.
This was the beginning of a group of products that are used in agriculture today.
Further development — Air2Air Activation Technology
Lelas' tribomechanical activation was the origin. But technology continues to evolve.
At Steinkraft, we have developed our own production method using Air2Air Activation Technology — a further development of the tribomechanical process. Air2Air Activation Technology is an airflow grinding process: the raw materials are pulverized in an air stream. Without abrasion. Electrostatically charged. Highest purity. Maximum effectiveness.
The name says it all: Air2Air. Air to Air. The particles meet in the air stream — not on metal surfaces, not in rotating drums. Mineral against mineral, in an air stream that generates the collisions.
The raw material source: Košice, Eastern Slovakia. 100% clinoptilolite zeolite. The purity is controlled. Transportation takes place in completely sealed BigBags — no bulk goods, no paper sacks that could absorb moisture. And no loose bulk material.
And we produce it ourselves — we determine when and how finely it is ground. This is not a detail. It is the core of our quality control.
What happens in the market — and why you need to look closely
Where a successful technology emerges, imitators follow. This is normal. The problem arises when imitators do not understand the technology — or when they deliberately mislead.
Ball mill zeolite sold as "ultra-fine". In our own lab, we measured a supposed 50-micron product — and found particles up to 300 micrometers. This is deceptive. And a product that won't do much on a plant leaf — not even in the soil.
Sieved or crushed calcite as foliar fertilizer. Calcite that has simply been sieved or conventionally ground does not have the electrostatic charge that draws it through the leaf pores. It remains on the plant's leaf. It is chemically detectable. But it does not penetrate and has no effect inside the leaf.
Tribodynamic instead of tribomechanical. There are products that call themselves tribodynamic — a different process with different properties. The name sounds similar. The effect is different. Caution is advised here.
The mistaken claim. We recently saw a product about which it was written: "Tribomechanical — destroys the crystal lattices." This is the exact opposite of the truth. Tribomechanical activation preserves the crystal lattices — that is its decisive advantage over the ball mill. It is the ball mill that destroys the crystal lattices. Anyone who misrepresents this has either not understood the technology — or is deliberately deceiving.
The questions one should ask before buying a zeolite or calcite product:
How was it ground — ball mill or tribomechanically? Where does the raw material come from — and has it been tested for heavy metals? How large are the particles really — and can this be proven?
From Styria to the World
Tihomir Lelas began in a pigsty near Deutschlandsberg in 1987. He built a machine that howled, dusted, and thundered like a jumbo jet. In doing so, he discovered something that science had not known until then.
Today, the technology he founded is used on coffee plantations in Colombia, in vineyards in France, on sugarcane fields in Africa, and in orchards in Lower Austria.
What Lelas never stopped believing: that nature has the best solutions. That a mineral, properly processed, can achieve more than any synthetic chemistry. And that this performance is measurable — in Brix value, in yield, in taste.
The thinking stone is still thinking. Today in leaves, in soils, in fruits.
What tribomechanically activated calcite triggers in the leaf — the complete mechanism of action — in the photosynthesis article.
What this process achieves in practice — field studies from four continents — in the large overview of studies.
How to check zeolite quality yourself — five questions everyone should ask — in the Quality Blog article.
Grünkraft Calcium direct — to the product page.
Sources: Ingomar Schwelz, "Megamin — the substance of the future", SEIN Magazin 2002 | Megagreenpower.de, History of tribomechanical activation | steinkraft-naturerocks.com, Blog article tribomechanical grinding process | steinkraft-naturerocks.com, Blog article Particle sizes and quality | steinkraft-naturerocks.com, FAQ Zeolite quality | Dr. Peter Ost, Quote on tribomechanically activated calcite as foliar fertilizer
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