English
Loading scrap metal efficiently takes vision
Winter 2016
Scrap metal recycling is big business — 56 million tons of scrap iron and steel are processed annually in the United States, according to the Department of the Interior. The material comes to the recycler in all shapes and sizes, making it, at times, very difficult to handle.
Two firms count on Doosan material handlers to make that process more efficient — Jack’s Recycling of Mount Morris, Pennsylvania, and Chamley Pipe and Salvage of Williston, North Dakota. Both companies would not want to be without their productive material-handling machines.
Jack’s Recycling: Here today, gone tomorrow
Rick Smith, owner of Jack’s Recycling, considers himself “one of the new kids on the block” because of his business philosophy: Whatever is purchased today is sold today or tomorrow. He does not keep any scrap metal on the ground.
“When I got into the business, I wondered why keeping piles and piles of scrap metal laying around was so common,” he says. “It seemed to me that the faster you could sell the stuff, the faster you could get your money back. Right now we are spending $40,000 to $50,000 a day buying scrap.”
And he’s sending it out as fast as possible on one of his two 18-wheel tractor-trailers. Most often the destination is Pittsburgh. Last year Smith sent 972 loads in 250 working days to one of his vendors in the Steel City.
One new machine that fits perfectly with Smith’s philosophy of handling scrap metal quickly and efficiently is a Doosan DX210WMH wheel material handler. Specifically designed for the recycling and solid waste industries, it has rubber tires instead of steel tracks and is loaded with top-of-the-line features, including a standard 7-foot hydraulic elevating cab, front and rear stabilizers, straight boom and drop-nose stick, rotate-ready hydraulics and a maximum reach of nearly 36 feet.
Smith points out that the material handler is equipped with a magnet, making it “great for unloading trucks full of smaller items such as car rotors. The material handler and the magnet can clear out a truck in a couple of minutes.”
The elevated operating position is the key to the machine’s efficiency. The operator can see inside the truck bed and know exactly where to pick out metal objects that might be stuck together or in a corner. “No more guesswork or wasted time,” Smith says.
When building an outgoing load, the material handler allows the operator to spread out the material evenly.
“Not only can you get more into the truck, but you can position things better,” Smith says. “For example, if you have an empty spot that is two feet wide, you look for something that will fit instead of dropping in a larger item that won’t go in the space. The DX210WMH material handler makes loading a truck much more efficient.”
And that fits perfectly with what Smith wants to do: keep the material moving.
Chamley Pipe and Salvage: Loading railcars quickly
For Chamley Pipe and Salvage, outgoing material has to be trucked 30 miles in 15-ton-capacity roll-off containers from the company’s processing lot to the railroad loading site. So, waiting to load the railcars is a Doosan DX225MH-3 material handler.
“That machine has made this job much more efficient,” says Mitchell Phillips, yard foreman. “Compared to the excavator with bucket and clamp I previously used, the DX225MH-3 grabs more material and holds it better. Because I can see into the railcar, I can do a better job of placement. I can identify gaps in the load and fill in material where needed. With the excavator, I relied on someone to guide me in positioning the scrap metal. Sometimes the lack of clear vision would cause me to stack the material above the side of the car.
That is not permitted, so I would have to spend time using the bucket on the excavator to pack it down.”
The material handler has eliminated all of the time-wasting practices.
“Everything is so simple,” Phillips says. “All I have to do is flip a switch to raise the cab to see right where I am placing material. It only takes a couple of hours to load a railcar.”
Company owner Will Chamley adds: “When Mitchell was loading the railcars with the excavator, he was sort of operating blind. The Doosan material handler makes his job 100 percent easier and safer.”
The DX225MH-3, which is also used to load the company’s 700-horsepower wood chipper, rates high in operator comfort, easy-to-operate controls, cab design and fuel efficiency, according to Phillips and Chamley. “I can run it for 10 hours a day and barely use a quarter-tank of diesel fuel,” Phillips says.
From Pennsylvania to North Dakota, the consensus of these two firms is that a Doosan material handler is perfect for increasing efficiency when handling scrap metal.
