Making Recycling More Efficient

“Recycling always starts with size reduction,” says Tony Eccles, president of Uni-shred, located in Mississauga, Ont. “Our line of shredders can make this part of the process much less labor and time intensive.”

Eccles says Uni-shred’s line of high-torque, single-shaft shredders utilizes “controlled feeding” to break up large bales of materials or large parts economically at low horsepower. A hydraulic feed mechanism feeds material progressively, allowing the material to be gradually pushed into the cutting area. The feature eliminates the need to first de-bale or cut up material before placing it into shredder with conventional or uncontrolled feeding.

Another advantage of Uni-shred’s size-reduction equipment is the single-shaft design, says Eccles. Unlike a twin-shaft granulator, the single-shaft design can be used with a screen to separate like-sized pieces of material. The result, Eccles says, is usually a product requiring no secondary regrinding which can be fed directly into a six- or eight-in. extruder.

The concept for a single-shaft, controlled feeding shredder originated in Europe and is currently used in the design of size-reduction equipment by several other North American manufacturers, Eccles notes. Uni-shred, however, is the only company to use a square-cut rotor, which eliminates wrap-around and fall-through of particles in comparison to a V-shaped rotor.

A Uni-shred-built shredding line installed at a Quebec recycling operation improved throughput from 2000 lb./hr to 8000 lb./hr. Says Eccles: “With the previous system they had to break up large bales of material. With ours, they fill the machine up, push a button and walk away.”

RECYCLING