Starlinger
Recycling of plastic films
Moscow, January 25, 2012
Paul Niedl. Head of Sales- recycling technology
© Starlinger & Co. GmbH.
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© Starlinger & Co. GmbH.
Recycling of plastic films
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Table of content
• company introduction
• film recycling: definitions and applications
• machinery and equipment
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© Starlinger & Co. GmbH.
Recycling of plastic films
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company introduction
© Starlinger & Co. GmbH.
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© Starlinger & Co. GmbH.
Recycling of plastic films
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• Family owned business, founded 1835 in Vienna
• World leader in machinery for woven packaging
• Diversified in Business Units
• Recycling equipment since 1987
Business unit since 2002
• 550 employees in Austria (Vienna,
Weißenbach)
• Regional hubs for sales, service and parts
• Turnover of appr. USD 250 million
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© Starlinger & Co. GmbH.
Recycling of plastic films
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recoSTAR basic
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© Starlinger & Co. GmbH.
recoSTAR universal
recoSTAR PET iV+
viscoSTAR
Recycling of plastic films
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film recycling:
definitions and applications
© Starlinger & Co. GmbH.
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© Starlinger & Co. GmbH.
Recycling of plastic films
Sources of waste- Definitions
• Production waste
- In house recycling
- Post industrial recycling
- Toll recycling
• Post consumer waste
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Recycling of plastic films
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Issues inhouse recycling
• Inline or Offline recycling?
• Different shapes of waste (from light-weight blown film to hard-to-grind start-up
lumps) needs to be handled
• Recycling line has to be operated in addition to the production lines
• Material management for waste has unfortunately not highest priority• -but decent material management avoids contamination
• High amount of re-granulate should be (directly) fed back into production line without
influencing film quality
• Edge-trim recycling must be completely automatic
(e.g. stand-by mode when film line is stopped)
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© Starlinger & Co. GmbH.
Recycling of plastic films
Issues post industrial recycling
• Different materials: Quick changeover required
• Mixing of different material from clients must be avoided-
- if toll recycling
• Mixing of different material to increase value or decrease cost-
- if not toll recycling.
Issues post consumer recycling
• Sorting required?
• Washing or Dry-washing required?
• Economically feasible?
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Recycling of plastic films
Film recycling: A wide range from commodity to specialty
• single layer unprinted
• multilayer materials
• machine direction or bi-axially oriented film
• material partially or heavily printed-
influence on re-use
• metallised
• humidity from outside storage or hygroscopic
humidity
• solid contamination could be a demanding job for
melt filtration
• ultra fine filtration
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Recycling of plastic films
Film recycling: A wide range from commodity to specialty
• LLDPE, LDPE, HDPE
• OPP, BOPP, PP
• BOPA
• BOPET
• PLA and other bioplastics
• and others
 Pick the right
recycling equipment
depending on the requirements
 recoSTAR basic or recoSTAR universal
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Recycling of plastic films
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machinery and equipment
© Starlinger & Co. GmbH.
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Recycling of plastic films
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recoSTAR basic and recoSTAR universal- process flow
• extrusion and pelletising of plastic films
• difference is pre-treatment section only
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Recycling of plastic films
recoSTAR basic
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recoSTAR universal
• agglomerator/extruder combination
• single shaft cutter/extruder combination
• precutting may be required depending on
• no precutting required
input material
• higher moisture possible
• inline application, high automation poss.
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• cold cutting & feeding
• high automation
Recycling of plastic films
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recoSTAR universal- working principle
• Single shaft cutter connected parallel to single screw extruder
• Material gets cut in single shaft cutter and cold fed with speed controlled dosing screw into extruder
• Exact dosing of material and control of output possible thanks to three drive design
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Recycling of plastic films
recoSTAR universal- feeding options
• Material is fed without precutting into recycling line.
• Feeding per conveyor belt and/or nip roll feeder and/or edge trim cyclone possible.
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Recycling of plastic films
recoSTAR universal- single shaft cutter
• Single shaft cutter runs slowly and is water
cooled or oil heated. Single shaft cutter will
automatically reverse and cut loose.
• “Cold” cutting
• Round hopper bottom & pusher avoids bridging
• Bearings fixed outside of cutting chamber,
central greasing system.
• High storage capacity reducing operator
interference
• Knives turn able increasing life-time
• Exact cutting geometry/high output/low energy
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Recycling of plastic films
recoSTAR basic- working principle
• material gets cut, dried and thermally
compacted in the agglomerator drum
• pre-heating of material by friction
• temperature raised to just under melting
point
• rotating disc (400-700 rpm), stainless steel
with knives
• continuously feeding of compacted material
into extruder by centrifugal force
• rate of material feeding is controlled
automatically by load of agglomerator
motor.
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Recycling of plastic films
recoSTAR basic- feeding options
• Precutting may be required depending on material to be processed.
• Feeding per conveyor belt and/or nip roll feeder and/or edge trim cyclone possible.
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Recycling of plastic films
Extruder
• Single screw extruder with air cooling.
• 24 L/D w/o degassing, 40 L/D w/ degassing.
• Smooth metering zone.
• Vacuum degassing reduces moisture, ink, spin finish
• Non-sensitive water ring vacuum pump
(option rotary vane high vacuum pump)
• Impurities are captured in oil condenser for proper disposal.
• Closed circuit with heat exchanger in stainless steel.
• Heavily printed film up to 100% and/or multi color:
- 2 degassing extensions to a total 56 L/D
- adding of CaCO3 powder to avoid ink build up
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Recycling of plastic films
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Continuous melt filter without and with backflushing
Double piston filter
Double piston backflushing filter
• Automatic filter, no production stop for screen changing process
• Backflushing filter extends service life of screens
• Design: Straight melt flow, no dead spots, big open screen surface, deaeration valve
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© Starlinger & Co. GmbH.
Recycling of plastic films
Continuous melt filter with Power backflushing
• for processing of material with higher
degree of contamination
• for processing of material with expected
contamination peaks
• power backflush pressure provided
by external hydraulic cylinder  i.e.
filter will be flushed with high pressure
• pressure constant, back flush separated
• piston cleanable on complete surface
• main advantage:
low melt loss during filtration, less filter discs required
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Recycling of plastic films
Water Ring Pelletizer
• PE, PS, PP with MFI ≤ 80, PA 6 and others
spherical/lenticular granules,
low investment, easy to handle,
low operating costs
• Knife head supported in die head
ensuring parallelism
• Magnetic clutch for knife head drive
• Easy and quick knife change,
no adjustment required
• Coarse grain separation
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Recycling of plastic films
Water Ring Pelletizer
•
Variety of dies (number / diameter of holes) and knife
heads (number of knives) available for different
material
•
Cooling-hose flexible set-up for adjusted cooling time
•
Centrifuge for excellent drying (< 0.1 %)
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Recycling of plastic films
Strand Pelletizer
• PET, PA, PP with MFI >80
< 0,3% crystallinity for PET and others.
• cylindrical pellets
+ low investment
+ flexible application
+ low operating costs
- limited in throughput due to the handling
- operator always needed
- no automatic operation
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Recycling of plastic films
Automatic Strand Pelletizer
•
all thermoplasts
•
cylindrical pellets
+ automatic operation
+ flexible application
+ broken strands are automatically re-inserted
+ for high througput
- investment
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Recycling of plastic films
Under Water Pelletizer
•
PE, PP max. MFI 200,
PET iV > 0.6, PA and others
•
PET iV < 0.6 with melt pump
•
spherical granules
+ low space demand
+ inline crystallistion for PET
+ for high throughputs
+ savings on energy consumption
+ easy handling
- investment
- maintenance
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Recycling of plastic films
Under Water Pelletizer with inline crystallisation
• for PET:
~15% crystallinity,
+ additional savings on energy
consumption.
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Recycling of plastic films
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Available machine capacities
Extruder Ø
Output (w/o venting)
Output (with venting)
65
150 – 230 kg/h
130 - 200 kg/h
85
280 – 400 kg/h
230 – 350 kg/h
105
400 – 600 kg/h
350 – 500 kg/h
125
650 – 850 kg/h
550 – 800 kg/h
165
900 - 1400 kg/h
720 - 1300 kg/h
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© Starlinger & Co. GmbH.
Recycling of plastic films
Technical Center in Weissenbach near Vienna
•
The full Starlinger recoSTAR product range installed
•
Laboratory for MFR, IV, color, moisture, impurity and other tests
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Trials for clients
•
R&D internally
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Recycling of plastic films
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Thank you for your participation
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© Starlinger & Co. GmbH.