Does paper recycling in the USA have any rail connections in 2011?
Or, to put it another way, how about paper recycling as an industry for the RR modeller?
I would imagine that baled paper gets moved in boxcars - loaded/unloaded by fork lifts… but I suppose that it could go in gons in dry weather… (I know from experience that baled paper can get a lot heavier when wet).
What would a factory need to change scrap paper to new? Acids? Rags? Woodchip? Kaolin?
Anyone know please?
I guess that another thing to look at would be cardboard and other similar products…
1, I don’t know, but it could from large printing facilities or recycler
2, yes, why not?
3, should be boxcars, probably in empties of paper delivered to printer.
4, it usually gets put in with new pulp at a 50/50 or 85% recycled mix, some paper companies do 100% recycled, but manly newsprint, any thing else is real crap to use, trust me, I’m a pressman.
5, I’m not sure, but it does get recycled.
both, more times than not are shipped by truck,mh.
Definitely yes. Many paper mills making kraft paper or cardboard use recycled paper as an input.
You can model the recycler which would be a warehouse with a loading dock and special fork lifts would load baled paper into plain boxcars. The fork lifts don’t have tines, they have big clamps that squeeze a bale of paper and pick it up.
Or you can model a paper mill that uses the recycled paper as an input.
The recycler would be in a more urban setting, the paper mill in a more rural. Paper is also a big export item to Mexico.
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I would imagine that baled paper gets moved in boxcars - loaded/unloaded by fork lifts… but I suppose that it could go in gons in dry weather… (I know from experience that baled paper can get a lot heavier when wet).
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I have never seen it moved in gons, getting it wet would damage it.
You would just model a paper mill and it would recieve all the regular paper mill stuff. Since recycled paper will be lower grade, rags and kaolin would probably be low on the list.
There’s a place not far from here called Capitol Fiber. They get truckloads of waste paper from all over DC. Their big client appears to be the Washington Post. They shred and bale paper, then ship it off in a huge string of boxcars. From pictures online and driving past it, it seems like they don’t bleach the paper or anything. Just bales of old newspapers loaded out.
[:O] WOW! Two really successful threads at once! great answers! [tup]
Possibly dividing traffic up - what sort of trucks bring in scrap bales please?
…we use demount/tipper bodies (demolition truck style) the haulage company leaves the body at the industry producing the bales (as a bi-product) until told they’re full and then swap them for a fresh empty.
… we also use curtain-side semis (I don’t think you use them as much as Europe does) and load them carefully by forklift in two lines of two tiers. These get really heavy - one site I know has just had to have strengthened concrete pads added where the feet stand - they were sinking in.
I’m wondering if (for the USA) I would use flats and sheet the load or demolition semis?
Of course the obvious question would be "how to make the bales? [:-,] Should make a change from squashed tin foil! I foresee the biggest bug being to get the “wires” round the bales to stay in place…
From experience paper bales are more cube shaped (6 flat faces) with tatty ends – cardboard bales tend to be more bulgy top and bottom (like a lady in a dress two sizes too small)… the ends are tatty or not depending on the uniformity of the pieces and who made the bale. They are much more varied than metal scrap billets/bales. They can also vary a lot in colour(s). … so this is an interesting modern modelling subject… and even the smallest places (including retail stores) make bales these days…
Some places also bale sheet plastic… that is vile to bale… but really fun if you get a huge load of giant bubble wrap! [(-D]
I always wondered why we had so many boxcars with roofs bulged upward, and how the roofs got that way in the first place. Then I observed boxcars being loaded with bales at a recycling plant, and it all became clear! The plants want to jam the cars full, and the forklift operators enthusiastically comply.
Dave,back in the nineties one shop I worked at, we baled our own scrap into 4’x4’x9’ bales, they were loaded in 48’ box trailers.A paper company gave us the shredder and baler and picked up the loaded trailers.mh
I was also thinking about putting a paper recycler loading facility on my layout. The New York and Greenwood Lake Railway between the towns of Garfield and Passaic in New Jersey started out serving Atlantic Coast Fibers who shipped bales of recycled paper in box cars. According to Wikipedia:
New York and Greenwood Lake Railway (1996)
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The New York and Greenwood Lake Railway (reporting mark NYGL) is a shortline railroad owned by Jim Wilson and based in Passaic, New Jersey. It operates primarily to service transfer station facilities for a few private companies, with a trans-load facility at its yard in Passaic. Cars run on NYGL’s trackage, the former Erie Railroad Dundee spur, to interchange with the Norfolk Southern Railway on New Jers