The Customer:

Weir Waste, based in Birmingham, is the leading independent recycling and waste management specialist in the West Midlands, and provides reliable and environmentally responsible waste management to a variety of business sectors.

The Challenge:

Weir Waste required a new pre-sort line to enable quicker process times through their automated MRF.

The Solution:

When looking for ways in which to improve the efficiency of their current process, and reduce wear and tear on their existing plant and shredder, Weir Waste turned to machinery distributor Blue Southern. Who, with the help of sister company BlueMAC Manufacturing, designed, manufactured and installed an innovative, tailor-made BlueMAC recycling plant with health and safety at the forefront of the build. The plant currently processes around 25-30 tonnes per hour; meaning an initial rate of between 180-220 tonnes per day. As well as significantly contributing towards the company’s waste recycling capabilities, the plant has also helped to enhance their reputation for reliability -as shredder machinery down time has notably decreased since installation.

The plant also includes a pause peddle which was integrated to allow pickers to momentarily stop the picking conveyor in order to break down balls of material. This feature was specifically integrated to reduce the number of balls of material being swept, by pickers, into single bins and so improving final material purity. When pressed, the pedal also immediately alerts the loader operator, via a traffic light system, that the plant is in a paused state.

In order to comply with Weir Waste’s high standard of health and safety, BlueMAC also incorporated the double safety mechanism of a castel locking system when designing the plant. This locking system includes a main locking key and a further 6 access keys for risk areas of the plant within a central locking ‘bank’. Only when the main key is in the off position and the plant is not operational can a risk area key be released for access to that particular area. This means that if a key to a risk area is removed to gain access for maintenance, the system ensures the safety of the maintenance operative as the plant will not become operational. It also requires for the master key to be removed from the power isolation switch and integrated into the key bank before any entry keys can be removed. Any risk areas must also be fully secured before the key to that area can be released, by the locking mechanism, for placement back into the main bank.

The Process:

• The initial waste material is loaded into a 6m hopper before moving to a 6m x 2m SPALECK high step waste screen via an incline conveyor
• Here the material is split into < and > 300mm
• The <300mm material is taken to the storage bay via conveyor before first passing an over-band magnet extracting ferrous material
• >300mm material is taken via a conveyor with a 90-degree bend to a vibratory pan feeder
• The vibratory pan feeder spreads the material across the entire belt to efficiently present the material before it is taken to the picking station
• Within the picking station there are 5 double sided bays whereby paper, card, film, textiles, and none ferrous material is extracted
• The picking station also contains a chevron conveyor meaning pickers are required to pick every item, rather than sweeping items into the separation bays
• The residual is then taken, via conveyor, underneath an over-band magnet separating ferrous material, and then transported to the storage bay
• All remaining material within the storage bay is taken to the existing main plant for shredding