New Wet Grinder Minimizes Operating Costs, Optimizes Flake Geometry for Film Shredding

Roetgen/Germany, Germany, October 2023. Hellweg Maschinenbau, a manufacturer of advanced, digitally controlled shredders for efficient plastics recycling, will premiere its wet grinder equipped with a forced feed system for film recycling at this year’s Fakuma. Its trailblazing drive concept uses low-power motors rated from 45 kW to 110 kW. These enable previously unattained low power consumption of the order of just 70 kWh to 90 kWh, so ensuring very low operating costs which are reduced still further by high throughputs of up to 5,000 kg of film per hour. Forced feed using a tamping screw ensures long-term, trouble-free operation even with contaminated input materials. Their usual, robust, heavy-duty and durable design means the new grinders can handle even demanding applications with high degrees of contamination.

Scissor-cut Technology for Perfect Flakes

PET, PE, PP, PS, PVC, PC, PLA, HDPE or LDPE films are force-fed to the grinders using tamping screws, which means smooth operation even with contaminated input materials. Depending on version, the grinders are fitted with five or seven rotary blades plus two or three static blades. Being highly wear-resistant, these blades provide additional, significant cost savings. As usual for Hellweg, these blades use double scissor-cut technology which sets a benchmark in terms of cut quality and dust-free operation, ensures a constant cutting gap and requires no adjustment of the rotary blades.

As a result, the shredding process consistently produces optimum quality flakes with a perfect particle size distribution and geometry. The flakes’ sharp-edged and, above all, flat shape without twists or folds makes them ideal for further processing including transport, washing and, if necessary, delamination. This advantageous technology also minimizes fines which usually cannot be used as a new, valuable raw material. Depending on the screen size used, fines content is typically a very low 3% or less.