Waste Weighing to monitor and control Raw Material Input

AWM Limited, alongside one of their trade partners, recently installed a dual scale waste weighing system to monitor the raw material input for a leading Plastics Company. Prior to the installation the company was having to estimate the amount of bottles and recycled plastics going into their process from volumetric data. AWM were tasked with designing a waste weighing system that would enable an accurate measurement of the amount of plastic material being entered into the process in loose and bale form.

The solution was to install two scales, one hopper scale for the loose plastics and one platform scale for the plastic bales. Both scales were connected to a Cardinal 825 Programmable Weight Indicator which continually monitors the weight input and waits for the waste material to be loaded on either scale.

 

The hopper scale controls a large traffic light which turns green when the hopper is ready to fill and red when it has reached it's maximum weight. This ensures the hopper is never overloaded by letting the loader driver know when to stop filling. Once the target weight has been met, the 825 Indicator waits for stability and then records the weight into it's on-board memory and adds the weighing record to an html report file that can be viewed and downloaded from any PC on the network. The indicator then turns on the conveyor system to remove the material from the hopper and once empty turns it off ready for the next load. 

 

At the same time that the hopper is being filled, a forklift driver can load bales of plastic onto a second platform scale that the 825 Weight Indicator is also monitoring. Once the weight is over a set threshold and stable, the 825 records the weight data and adds it to the html report file.

 

The key to this solution is that the weight of raw material inputted into the system is accurately captured but the speed of the loading operation is maintained. We supplied the complete turn-key solution from the Hopper and Weight Indicator with custom control software to the Traffic Lights and platform scale.