This forward thinking organisation chose to plan well in advance due to the scale of their operation - their UK site is one of the largest food factories in Europe - so companies were approached several years ago to establish how best to deal with the situation. The cost and security factors mentioned earlier pointed firmly to the advantages of dealing with the waste on site, so that a range of products could be separated from brand-identified packaging before any other downstream processing company was allowed into the loop. It was only a case of establishing which machine or process best fitted the requirements of this separation process.

Eventually it was decided that a third party contractor could be rented space on the site to offer the service of dealing with reject products and that this should mean that a variety of food products should be efficiently separated from their packaging / containers for further processing so that none would leave the site intact with the company's brand name.

Various types of machine were tested. A shredding machine for instance, made a very good job of

cutting cans and in rolling them flat on completion, but, the problem still remained of food residues on the cans. Companies recycling tin plate need relatively clean and dry scrap to make the process workable. If alternatively the cans were land-filled, the problem of high COD (chemical oxygen demand) leachates would still remain.

After various test runs the company eventually tested the Turbo Separator and were impressed by its effectiveness. Essentially, the vigorous and continuous centrifugal action of the rotating shaft with its paddles and studs played a major role in the machine's success. It was also significant that the engineers carrying out the tests were committed to configuring the machine's parameters to get the best result; the Turbo Separator is not an 'off the peg' solution for every product-packaging separation application but needs to be skilfully set to get the best results. The tubular body with a laterally arranged rotating shaft has a bottom outlet for the product discharge and an end discharge for the containers / packaging. The centrifugal action helps to remove all but a thin film of organics from the can surfaces so that they are dry within a short time of being rejected and in an acceptable condition for tin recycling companies.

On the strength of its on site test performance combined with the attentive services of the supplier's engineers, the company concerned decided to adopt the Turbo-Separator for this rigorous application.