Non-Ferrous Metal Recovery

Team: Zippy Ball, Annie Darrington, Wyatt Smith, Dylan Thompson, Chase Trujillo

Sponsor: Western Metals Recycling

Project Description

The purpose of this project is to increase the amount of non-ferrous metal recovered that is being missed by current plant processes. Currently, approximately $1 million is lost annually due to the inability to recover the non-ferrous metal. The requirements of this design are to be able to recover 90% of the metal coming off the tail-end of the plant. Of the 90% recovered material, at least 80% has to be sellable.

Design Description

The original set up for testing

The original set up for testing

Second test setup

Second test setup

The final drawing of the fan set up

The final drawing of the fan set up

Final test setup

Final test setup

Performance Review

  • The design was tested three different times. The first test was a proof of concept to see whether the process that had been decided on was actually viable as a solution. The first test was using a weak fan that was already at the plant to see if it could blow the unwanted material and leave the metal. The first test proved that the unwanted material would blow away while the metal would remain.
  • The second test involved a much more powerful fan, and was meant to provide information about the effectiveness of the design, and find ways to improve it. The second test found that our more powerful fan would separate 84% of the metal from the unwanted material, and 89% of the separated material was sellable.
  • The third and final test used a fan with more power, a bin for collection and to keep material from bouncing out of the collecting space, and had the final stand built. The final test determined the optimal placement of our bin to be 39 in. from the front of the fan. The final design recovered 90.6%of the metal and 81.2% of the recovered material was sellable.

Conclusion

  • By the end of the project we were able to achieve 90% recovery as well as 80%quality of the recovered metal
  • We learned the importance of staying within your scope of work. We also learned the importance of collecting data
  • From here the project can be upgraded by adding a vibrating bounce plate to reduce the amount of material that gets stuck on the bounce plate.