When Rubberecycle opened its doors nearly eighteen months ago,
it already had the tire contract for Ocean County, NJ in hand
and an eager parks and recreation department ready to install
the company's signature product - Playsafer™ - a crumb rubber
surfacing material for use on playgrounds and recreation areas.
In fact, Rubberecycle has been
a part of the county's solid waste management plan since March
1997, Ocean County Freeholder John C. Bartlett Jr. said.
For Rubberecycle President Robert
Gestetner and Corporate Executive Officer Morris Hassan getting
on board with the county was one component of a strategic planning
effort that spanned more than five years. "We did our homework
and then some," Morris Hassan said.
Not only did the pair research
the recycled rubber products market throughout North America,
Europe and the Far East, they hunted down equipment and tested
various technologies and shopped location before settling on
their present 45,000 sq.ft. facility in Lakewood, NJ.
"One of our first goals was to
produce a product that would contribute to reducing both the
number and severity of children's playground injuries," Hassan
said.
To accomplish that goal, Hassan
and Gestetner put together a system to manufacture a high quality
protective rubber surfacing product that would meet or exceed
the shock absorbing levels set forth by the Consumer Products
Safety Commission and other national testing agencies and be
affordable too.
The system at Rubberecycle consists
of a two-stage ambient processing operation followed by a cryogenic
system and a hammermill for final granulation to 100 mesh size.
Tires and tire material entering
the plant is first shred using a Columbus McKinnon primary shredder
with recirculation capability to produce 2-inch chips which
are the feedstock for downstream processing. The chips are routed
to the secondary processing unit - Granutech-Saturn Systems
Grizzly Grinder. The Grizzly, using a single-rotor configuration,
takes the 2-inch material and effectively downsizes it to the
1/2" - 5/8" sizes Rubberecycle requires for its Playsaferª line
and Equestrian products.
"One of the key benefits of the
Grizzly for our operation," Hassan said, "is its ability to
liberate steel from rubber. " Getting the majority of the steel
out early in our processing operation is a significant cost
savings and a key step in our quality control system," Hassan
said. "We guarantee our final product is 99.9 percent free of
metal--the equipment we use is a big part of meeting the guarantee,
" he said. In addition to the Grizzly, the Rubberecycle system
has magnetic separation units throughout which include four
Rare Earth magnets and two belt magnets.
In Rubberecycle's fine grind
processing division size-reduced crumb rubber (1/2" - 5/8" depending
on screen size) is introduced into a cryogenic system designed
and engineered by GC Engineering, Colona, British Columbia.
In the process the crumb rubber enters a specially designed
cryogenic chamber and is cooled to embrittlement. Final granulation
takes place in cryo-grinding hammermills manufactured by Pulva
Corp., Saxonburg, Pa which reduce the frozen particles to 80
mesh and 100 mesh sizes.
The company currently processes
between 5,000 and 7,000 tires a day and is designed to handle
2 million scrap tires annually as demand increases for Rubberecycle's
products and recycled rubber materials.
"The Playsafer™ product has really
taken off," Hassan said. And while he credits some of this market
growth to the company's direct mailing and advertising campaigns,
most comes from "word-of-mouth", he said.
Last March, Ocean County installed
a six-inch deep mulch bed of Playsafer™ under the play equipment
at the Shenandoah Fields Sports complex.
To launch the installation (Rubberecycle's
first in the state), county officials did the egg test - climbing
atop a 14 ft. high piece of play equipment to drop an egg on
the 6-inch cushion of Playsafer™. The egg bounced (and didn't
break) catching the attention of a local TV reporter who repeated
the test for Ocean County viewers in turn catching the attention
of CNN.
"We got instant publicity but
over the months the majority of our sales have come from visitors
to the park who get to see and experience Playsafer'sª benefits
first hand," Joshua L. Hill, Rubberecycle's director of sales
said. The newest market to develop from this is homeowner sales,
he said.
"Once people visit the park and
their children play on the rubber surfacing -- they want it,"
Hill said. "It's a safety cushion that can protect their children."
Another New Jersey community,
Fair Lawn in Bergen County, spent $43,375 last year to resurface
12 playgrounds with recycled rubber. Playsaferª was used on
eight of the playgrounds, Fair Lawn's superintendent of recreation
said.
Along with Playsafer™, Rubberecycle
has spent its first year of operation developing its second
product line --Surefoot™--an equestrian arena protective footing.
Surefootª is a 3/8" size particle which can be used independently,
blended with sand or readily combined with other surface materials,
Hassan said. The company works with equestrian arena builders
to promote the product and also advertises in trade magazines
and displays at industry shows.
"We have several installations
at arenas in New Jersey and, like the playground market, a lot
of our arena sales are now coming by word of mouth," Hassan
said.
With the company's two flagship
products on firm ground, Hassan and Gestetner are doing additional
research in their fine grind division. "Our goal is two-fold
-- to make and sell a high quality line of fine grind crumb
rubber and develop a rubber products manufacturing division,"
Hassan said.
"Right now we're researching
different molding technologies and equipment and testing some
alternative binders, like scrap plastics, to replace the more
expensive polyurethanes, " he said.
