Mechanical drying in Loop Dryer
Dinos uses the Loop Dryer for mechanical drying of the shredded and washed plastic flakes. In the Loop Dryer any particles adhering to the material, such as paper fibres, are detached using controlled centrifugal force and the materials are dried. This powerful dryer has a total weight of approx. 8.7 metric tons. The rotor diameter is approx. 1,500 mm with a rotor length of approx. 3,000 mm.
The centrifugal force resulting from this considerable rotor radius and the large screen surface ensure a high efficiency of the facility, making it possible to dry hard plastics such as HDPE and PP to less than three percent residual moisture in a single drying step. After mechanical drying, the film fractions are transported by means of a blower to a thermal drying stage before the material is fed into the extruder.
Gentle extrusion and highly efficient filtration
When it comes to extrusion, Dinos relies on the know-how of Erema. On the patented INTAREMA® TVEplus® extruder system in RegrindPro® design with a Laserfilter, everything from LDPE film fractions to HDPE and PP granulate can be processed. This all-rounder machine can process plastic granulate of all densities, thanks to its wide input bulk density range of 30 to 800 g/l. Feeding is automatic, in accordance with customer requirements. The input material is slowly and homogeneously heated in the preconditioning unit, ensuring highly effective drying and degassing of the filtered melt. Dwell time of the granulate is one hour. Hot air flows through the material and any volatile molecules are removed. This results in significant odour reduction in an early stage of processing, which ultimately widens the scope of applications for the regranulate. The extruder is filled continuously with hot material and a universal direct-drive extruder screw makes it possible to switch between different types of regranulate without changing parts.
In the next step, the Erema Laserfilter with a filtration fineness of up to 70 µm removes non-melting dirt particles and impurities such as silicone before degassing. The final homogenisation of the melt between the filtration and degassing increases the degassing performance. The melt is thus optimally prepared for pelletising. “In addition to the high quality of the regranulate, a major advantage is the flexibility of this machine with regard to the polymer, regrind or film to be processed. After all, flexibility and the highest regrind quality prove their worth even in a challenging economic environment,” said Clemens Kitzberger, Business Development Manager for the Post Consumer Division of Erema Group GmbH.
Plant Manager Jure Jambrovic is very satisfied with the service of the two companies, “We’ve been very happy with the excellent collaboration and close communication with the technicians from Lindner Washtech and Erema. In particular, they gave us great support during the engineering phase, especially in coordinating the individual process steps. The plant has run smoothly from day one and delivers a very high output quality that is in great demand.”
