Machines

[xoxoxoBruce]

I'm putting this in machines rather than rims because I doubt it ever made the road, despite what the 1914 Mad Men claim, and the claims are whoppers.

The Airmobile used a “frictionless rotary engine fueled by crude oil” to power a “rotary air compressor” located behind it. Air pressure was stored in a pair of tanks and routed through a throttle to an air motor at each wheel. No one has uncovered photos or more information about this car other than an advertisement in the program for the Santa Monica Road Races and a few other places, the effort then disappeared into thin air…. By 1915 the Rotary Air Brake Company was promoting an air-steam-gas-water engine that is known to have been produced.
The company’s name was changed to the Rotary Products Company and in 1920 they began manufacturing air driven machinery for industry.

I think "frictionless" means I don't hear no squealing or scraping.

[xoxoxoBruce]

Shred a whole car, and I mean whole, tires, glass, interior, engine, in less than 3 minutes.

[Carruthers]

Presumably a cubic yard (or thereabouts) of compressed metal and other stuff comes out of the other end of the machine.
I'm just wondering how it's processed for re-manufacture given the volume of material that isn't steel.

[xoxoxoBruce]

In a typical shredding operation, cars are delivered with the wheels off, battery out and they are supposed to remove the gas tank, but I've seen enough explosions to know some don't, the rig is built sturdy enough to handle that. There are big blowers to separate the upholstery/foam, magnets to pick up the ferrous metal (some stainless is ferrous and some is not), but I'm not sure how they separate the plastic, copper, and aluminum because that's done offsite.
Goldfinger used a compactor, not a shredder.

[Beest]

Originally Posted by xoxoxoBruce

, copper, and aluminum because that's done offsite.
.

Eddy picks out the non-ferrous metals.
Hit them with an alternating magnetic field and Eddy currents are generated in the metal which in turn generates an opposing magnetic field and they are repelled. They can be just rolling down a conveyor and when they reach the magnet they fly off into a bin at the side.
Not sure if you can then sort Aluminum from Copper with a refinement of this technique.

[xoxoxoBruce]

Ah, thanks beest.
Much of the copper salvaged would be wire with a plastic coating, I guess that would be burned off, probably too expensive using chemicals to dissolve the plastic because of the cost of waste disposal.