Issue 03 – October 2012 Recycle with


Regrind or plastics recyclate is typically a term that applies to plastic components/ products, which have been mechanically reduced in size to particles less than 10mm in diameter.


“Plastics recycling” as such is most commonly understood to be a practice that has at some stage involved a marketplace, or has included a consumer in the product life–cycle loop. Plastics recycling in other words involves creating a 2nd life plastics – either in some form of closed loop – or in making another plastics product.


The term “plastics reprocessing” usually refers to an internal company practice of feeding scraps or sprues back into the manufacturing process, generally to save waste and save materials.


Regrind or plastics recyclate is typically a term that applies to plastic components/products, which have been mechanically reduced in size to particles less than 10mm in diameter.


The source of these plastic components can come from pre-consumer waste such as process scrap, or, less commonly, post-consumer waste.


This reduction process generally takes place in a device called a grinder or granulator.


Here plastic components are fed in through the throat of the grinder/granulator and then pass into a chamber that typically contains rotating knifes which mechanically cut the plastic component dimensions to a size small enough to pass through a screen. This regrind may then be:


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industry know-how


1. Fed directly back into the manufacturing process on a continuous basis.


2. Fed directly back into the manufacturing process on a batch basis.


3. Used in another manufacturing process such as a component for a compounded material containing the regrind (and other ingredients).


Given that thermoplastics are by definition capable of being heated and re-shaped many times, the use of regrind would appear to be an obvious solution to achieve greater rates of operational efficiency through the use of process scrap and/or reject components.


However, in order to determine the possibility to use regrind the following evaluation must be made:


1. Degradation Thermoplastic raw materials are inherently unstable at processing temperatures. The extent of degradation will be dependent upon:


Type of polymer The use of stabilisers Thermal history (time spent at processing temperature) Presence of other materials such as pigments and fillers


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