RB Recycling, Inc. located in Portland, Ore., has announced the opening of its new tire recycling facility. According to Rodney Washburn, of DASH Multi-Corp, “This is probably the most technically advanced tire recycling facility in the United States.”
The 44,000 square foot facility has the capacity to shred five million or more tires per year. The end result is that these tires will not have to be put into landfills, but instead can be turned into commercial products such as gym flooring, mats, and a variety of other end products.
The equipment will take modern radial tires and separate the steel, Kevlar fibers, and assorted other materials from the rubber. Washburn added, “The new facility has been designed and constructed to recycle all components that are generated when grinding a tire, i.e. the crumb rubber, the wire (which is bailed into squares), and the fiber removed from the process by high powered vacuum systems.”
The first stage of tire grinding reduces a tire to 3”x 6” pieces, called shreds. Shreds are then fed into a proprietary production line, which processes the rest and separates them into tire crumb, metal wire, and fiber. All components can be sold for other manufacturing processes. This completely recycles discarded items that would otherwise never decompose in a landfill.
Air filters on vacuum systems prevent particle release into the surrounding air, making the facility environmentally friendly, according to the company.
RB Recycling in Oregon is a subsidiary of St. Louis based Dash Multi-Corp, Inc. They are part of the Rubber Group, which also includes RB Rubber in McMinnville, Ore., and Milan Molded Rubber in Milan, Ga. These affiliated companies mix the recycled crumb rubber with an adhesive and mold them into a variety of end products.
DASH Multi Corp Inc., based in St. Louis, is a privately held corporation composed of companies that manufacture formulated plastics, chemical coated fabrics and recycled rubber products.
