Lindner installation boosts German facility’s wire recycling capabilities

Austria-based Loacker Recycling GmbH has worked with fellow Austrian company Lindner-Recyclingtech GmbH to bolster wire and cable recycling output at the Loacker Recycling facility in Wonfurt, Germany.

Loacker Recycling is a 100-year-old family business specializing in wire and cable recycling. It consists of 25 companies in total that operate 47 sites in eight countries.

The recycling plant in Wonfurt has been recycling wire and cable for decades. “The focus is on extracting pure materials to maximize the recyclables recovery,” Lindner says.

Currently in Wonfurt, Loacker uses a Polaris 2800 Lindner shredder with rotor cooling.

“A great deal of energy and expertise has been invested in expanding the recycling plant to achieve the best possible recycling results using the latest technology," says Matthias Köhler, who has been managing director at the Wonfurt site since 2012.

In a three-shift operation, up to 100 metric tons of end-of-life cables are processed into recyclable materials each workday. “We mainly recover copper from old cables, around 40 to 45 metric tons a day, but also PVC [polyvinyl chloride plastic] and ferrous metals,” Köhler says.

“While the copper is turned into copper sheets in copper smelters, we deliver the PVC to a company located on site. There, the plastics are turned into barrier products. Ferrous metals are sent for metal processing. The way our plant is equipped, we achieve a particularly high degree of purity. That’s what makes us unique and gives us the ability to return almost 100 percent of the recycled material back into the cycle.”

The Lindner Polaris 2800, which shreds copper cables to a final output size of less than 15 millimeters (0.6 inches), has been part of the Loacker plant in Wonfurt since last July.

“We are more than happy with the throughput rate and are particularly pleased that the shredder handles non-shreddables with ease, which do show up from time to time,” Köhler says.

In buying a Polaris, Lindner says Loacker made a conscious decision in favor of its screwable and quadruple-use blade cutting system.

“We change the knives every seven to eight days, which is extremely easy thanks to the screwable system,” Köhler says. “It is also easy to access the rotor, knives and knife holders.”

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“The Polaris 2800 has the necessary drive power," says Jan Rosenmeyer, sales manager at Lindner. Equipped with a countershaft drive and flywheel energy storage, the machine makes light work of shredding even difficult materials such as end-of-life cables with a high content of copper wire. The consistent throughput rate and high uptimes speak for themselves.”