The term 3D is currently on everyone’s lips in recycling. It involves the extremely precise screening and processing of recyclable materials. In concrete terms, the 3D COMBI type screening machine from the screening machine manufacturer SPALECK is shaping a new class of separation cut quality.
For the classification of materials that are difficult to separate, sticky and moist, it offers recyclers new recycling products with separation cuts from 0.2 to 120 mm. The latest development is the 3D COMBI Compost Screen especially for biomass. SPALECK customer OIde Bolhaar, one of the largest biomass processors in Germany, can for the first time offer its industrial compost customers a quality guarantee, even with different feed materials, thanks to the exact separation cuts and constant screening qualities of its new 3D COMBI Compost Screen. In addition, the screening machine increases its utilisation rate of the valuable compost content by more than 20 percent, with significantly less machine maintenance.
The moisture and long grain problems finally solved
Christiaan
Olde Bolhaar, managing partner of the compost specialist: “We have gained
very extensive experience using mobile and stationary screening plants. We
always had to struggle with two major problems: The strongly fluctuating
moisture content of our raw material over the year and the associated long
grain problems in the screened end product.“ Thus, the biomass specialist had
to increase its separation cuts considerably in the wet season, which in turn
led to harmful long grain parts. In the dry season, on the other hand,
increasingly finer sieving was carried out to prevent long grain parts as far
as possible. However, this inevitably led to the costly incorrect screening of
the valuable organic material. Nevertheless, the passage of faulty long grain
particels through the screening surface was not reliably prevented and
continued throughout the year. A constant screening quality was therefore
impossible.
Flip-Flow cassettes and 3D screening panels decisive
This
changed completely with the SPALECK 3D COMBI screening machine. “Even the
first test in the SPALECK TestCenter was very promising. Subsequently we
specified our exact requirements and tasks for SPALECK. We wanted to increase
the screening quality to a maximum and make the best possible use of the
valuable components of our raw material. After the second test we were absolutely
convinced that we had found the right partner for our complex screening
tasks.”
Frederik
Stening, head of the SPALECK TestCenter: “The breakthrough in the joint
development with Olde Bolhaar was our modular 3D COMBI screening technology
which can be adapted to the screening material. This enables recyclers with
difficult to screen materials, such as biomass processors, to produce a
year-round constant screening quality that is optimised for the end
customer.”
The 3D COMBI screening machine consists of an upper and a lower deck. For very moist material, Olde Bolhaar uses SPALECK Flip-Flow cassettes in the upper deck. These have an integrated Flip-Flow screening surface and can be easily installed by the user in the upper deck. Their purpose is the upstream screening of the fine fraction, so that in the further screening process moist, sticky and sometimes contaminating screening material is already screened on the upper deck. The downstream 3D screening panels of the upper deck then prevent faulty long grain particles from being shot into the lower deck. This means that long pieces such as horse mackerel, shrubbery, etc. are safely and completely removed via the upper deck. In summer, when the materials are sometimes very dry, the Flip-Flow cassettes can then be replaced by 3D screening panels from SPALECK. The lower deck is then used to screen the middle grain and the composter’s valuable organic fines. Christiaan Olde Bolhaar: “The configuration of the lower deck is the same all year round. It enables us to screen the organic fines very reliably and consistently throughout the year, even with the most varied initial conditions of the material. For us, this is a significant simplification and increase in efficiency compared to our conventional screening machines.”
Win-win-win situation for the complete recycling process
In
particular the recycler’s end customers, i.e. the substrate manufacturers and
their private end customers, benefit from the screening performance of the
SPALECK vibratory screening machine. Christiaan Olde Bolhaar: “With the
new 3D COMBI Compost Screen we are able to guarantee our customer an excellent
soil with high organic content all year round. This benefits the hobby soil
users, but especially the professional buyers, the greenhouses and soil
producers. Compared to that time, all our products are now almost completely
free of long grain impurities. This enables us to significantly increase our
quality level compared to our competitors in the market.” As a result, the
company was able to significantly upgrade its compost products and develop new
sales opportunities. Frederik Stening, contact person at SPALECK: “For us
it is important that our customers can flexibly adapt their SPALECK screening
machine to changing feed materials. This is the only way to guarantee that they
can reliably deliver the separation cut qualities required by the end
customer.”
The
IFAT 2020 offers an optimal overview of the innovations from SPALECK. Here, the
Bocholt specialists for conveying and separation technology will present, among
other things, their extensive SPALECK Connect technology for comprehensive and
foresighted machine maintenance as well as material-specific processing
concepts for plastics, shredder fractions, electronic scrap and more. A visit
to the SPALECK stand 439 in hall B6 is therefore well worthwhile.
www.spaleck.de/ifat