A partnership between international recycling company Galloo and equipment manufacturer STEINERT has led to a more effective way of separating non-ferrous metals for reuse.
In 2013, Belgium recycling giant Galloo moved to expand its operations.
The leading firm needed an efficient way of extracting non-ferrous metals, so they turned to family-owned international manufacturer STEINERT for a solution.
After extensive studies, STEINERT engineers developed a flexible machine concept for three different input materials, including automobile shredder residue, incinerator bottom ash and electronic scrap. This year, STEINERT launched their EddyC Fines separator – boasting increased separation and a 10-minute belt change system without lifting equipment.
Galloo R&D Officer Luc Wagnein says the company is impressed by the machine’s reliability, having worked with Steinert equipment since 1985.
“Ten years ago, you could only obtain standardised devices on the market. It was impossible for us to adapt them to our specific needs. That’s why we are extremely happy that we and STEINERT have been able to jointly develop a system that precisely meets our requirements,” Ms Wagnein says.
STEINERT explains it was challenging developing a non-ferrous metals separator that could handle extremely fine input materials, with grain sizes of 0.5-10mm. The company says the goal was to enable the three different materials to be to run through the system flexibly without any drop in the separation rate.
“Engineers wanted to further optimise the separation of non-ferrous metals out of the fine-grain fraction and, at the same time, simplify the machine’s operation and maintenance,” STEINERT says.
STEINERT adapted the output of the machine’s requirements and developed a splitter that could handle the three different types of fine grain material. As a result, fine gearbox adjustments can be made to the splitter to enable it to get within a few millimetres of the material, separating even the tiniest particles.
The machines now run at Galloo facilities in two shifts for a total of 16 hours a day. Luc says the new systems allows the team at Galloo to improve its separation rate of incinerator bottom ash – a key focus of its recycling strategy.
“We mainly recycle aluminium, copper, zinc and brass, as well as a few precious metals such as gold and silver,” Luc says.
The new system’s splitter plate ensures finer separation of materials by adjusting it specifically to separate materials.
“A gearbox enables users to set it with millimetre precision along three different axes and adjusts it even more accurately to the trajectories of a wide variety of materials. In addition, the machine has a program-controlled system, which hones in on predefined points of the trajectory of the metal,” says STEINERT Technical Director Nico Schmalbein.
To read more, see page 40 of Issue 12.