Hello from NH Manufacturer

Hello! I am from Hypertherm, a manufacturer of metal cutting equipment (plasma, waterjet, accessories, software). Our goal is to ensure that by 2020, none of our equipment ends its life in a landfill, and is instead 100% recycled. A lofty goal given that we don’t have much control over our end users, especially 5-30 years after they buy our equipment! My research has shown that most of our end users send our dead equipment to a local scrap yard where ever they are in North America. I believe that this is a great way for our ferrous and non-ferrous components (which make up the vast majority, by weight, of our systems) to be recycled. However, this may not be the best place to ensure that plastic breakage and printed circuit boards are properly recovered. Some of our systems could have 10 pc boards of good value in them, along with hard drives, CPUs, RAM, processors, etc.

While this is my primary question right now, I am looking to join the forum to learn more about the scrap industry in general, and to reach more people than cold-phone calls!
:recycle:

Welcome to the forum
I am interested to learn how you plan to achieve your goals.

I have a wild idea: First do you maintain contact with past customers and those who may purchase your used equipment? Perhaps you could ask them to contact you to obtain proper disposal assistance with equipment they want to dispose of. You could include a placard on each machine asking the owner to contact your company with end of use assistance.

Now to the assistance your company could provide. You can advertise on this forum. Let those responding to an ad from you what you expect in the type of service. You could be very informative in the weight, size and materials used in the construction of the machine(s) involved.

If you spend time reading the old threads you will find that our members are an intelligent group who work hard at self-education and dedicated to proper recycling.

Thank you for joining our forum. Mike

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Originally Posted by rtindall

Hello! I am from Hypertherm, a manufacturer of metal cutting equipment (plasma, waterjet, accessories, software). Our goal is to ensure that by 2020, none of our equipment ends its life in a landfill, and is instead 100% recycled. A lofty goal given that we don’t have much control over our end users, especially 5-30 years after they buy our equipment! My research has shown that most of our end users send our dead equipment to a local scrap yard where ever they are in North America. I believe that this is a great way for our ferrous and non-ferrous components (which make up the vast majority, by weight, of our systems) to be recycled. However, this may not be the best place to ensure that plastic breakage and printed circuit boards are properly recovered. Some of our systems could have 10 pc boards of good value in them, along with hard drives, CPUs, RAM, processors, etc.

While this is my primary question right now, I am looking to join the forum to learn more about the scrap industry in general, and to reach more people than cold-phone calls!
:recycle:

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hi,if you are in my area 01952 drop it off,ed.

Hello from northern NH.

It is pretty simple to obtain the zero landfill policy. The hardest thing would be the smaller items.

Many ways of doing it and would love to talk with you sometime if you need help.

I am part of a recycling group in NH that is connected with most municipalities in the state and could be useful to you.

I can't help but feel that a little bit of hands on experience would be the best teacher.

1: Locate a few old Dell desktops or towers from the early to mid 90's and tear them down for recycling.

2: Pick up about 10 Dell towers that were manufactured between 2001 - 2004. Tear them down for recycling.

A: Note the evolution in design between the older & the newer.

B: Scrapping is production work. We're under time pressure to perform. See if you can get your tear down time to under ten minutes.

3: Pick up about ten Mac computers from that same 2001 - 2004 time period. Tear them down with the objective of 100% recycling. Get your teardown time to under ten minutes.

Compare and contrast the Dell PC with the Mac. Make note of what you like and don't like about each .... then take the lessons learned and incorporate them into your own product.

I have come to the conclusion that in the future we won't actually buy something.
We will 'rent it' in a way.

Thus is a example.

I 'buy' a washing machine. Its got a 3 yr guarantee.
If it breaks within 3 years, they replace it with a brandnew one, or a recycled one of the same age, but with the confidence that it will last out the guarantee.

If it lasts longer than 3 years... Great!

Then when it does break. I call the manufacturer and they come and pick it up and I buy another off them.

Basicly I'm buying a guarantee off them that their washing machine will last 3 or more years.
BUT, the manufacturer actually owns the machine, they own the metal and parts inside it.
Its theirs and they actually have the metal in their inventory.....

If it lasts longer than 3 years, I'm happy, I don't expect it to last longer (actually it could be 5 years, or such..)

Or, every 3 - 5 years they replace it with a brand new one and I essentially just make payments on it.

Since the manufacturer makes the washing machine, they will also unmake it. And recycle it 100%.
Once you start recycling that volume and amount, its a fine art.

Also, the machines that break, or are made from recycled machines, can be sold as remanufactured machnes cheaper than the first machine. But with the same profit margin........

They can akso be sold cheaper to third world countrys.

Sorta like leviduty (SMF member from Domican republic) does with recycled fridge compressors.
Sort, test, examine, fix or repair, fit to new or secondhand fridge etc, sell.

BAsicly in the Dom republic, whitewear gets a 100% tax duty. Because either the people have lots of money and can afford to buy a new fridge and the tax markup.
Or they have no money and can't afford anything.
So its viable when people are only making $5 a day to recycle fridges from scrap.

Its impressive what they do. Analize the oil for burnt oil, copper fines, iron fines, water and rust.
That determines what the compressor is like inside.
Even stalled compressors can be 'bumped' to free them up.