Bunting Magnetics Europe, Berkhamsted, UK, has developed a system that separates and recovers printed circuit boards (PCBs).  The High Intensity Separation Conveyor (HISC) has an exceptionally strong magnetic head pulley and was originally designed to separate very weakly magnetic materials such as abraded and shredded stainless steel.  During on-site tests at a UK plastics recycling company, the HISC was found to efficiently separate and recover PCBs.

 

A PCB will contain gold, palladium, silver, copper and different hazardous materials, and cannot be disposed of in landfill. There are companies which specialise in recovering the precious metals from the PCBs, but firstly, these need to be recovered from a waste stream.

 

Bunting’s HISC magnetic separator is designed to be installed after primary magnetic separation and eddy current separation and is used either to remove weakly magnetic materials from the primary product, or to recover valuable materials. The strength of the magnetic field is far greater than with standard magnetic separators, extending the separation capabilities from just removing ferrous and strongly magnetic materials to materials that have a very low magnetic susceptibility. www.buntingeurope.com 

 

 

Separating waste metals from printed circuit boards with the HISC