Solid material comminution or disintegration – Apparatus – Combined or convertible
Reexamination Certificate
2002-06-17
2004-05-25
Rosenbaum, Mark (Department: 3725)
Solid material comminution or disintegration
Apparatus
Combined or convertible
Reexamination Certificate
active
06739535
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to pulverizing apparatus for shredding, redistributing and compacting trash in an open top container, and more particularly to such apparatus which is adapted for self-propelled travel on a public street or a highway.
Upwardly open (i.e., open top) containers are typically used to receive various types of waste or trash (e.g., metal, plastic, paper, cardboard and the like), especially at businesses and warehouses, to allow waste accumulation. Once a container has been filled to its volumetric capacity, it is ready for hauling, typically over public streets and highways, to remote waste disposal or landfill sites. A major cost factor in waste disposal relates to this transport of the container back and forth between the collection site and the waste disposal site. Other factors are the charges imposed by the waste disposal site and municipal taxes, the latter typically being based upon the volume (rather than the weight) of the waste dumped.
The uncompacted waste in an open top container comprises various pieces of trash loosely lying on top of each other (compressed only by the weight of the upper layers of trash on the lower layers of trash) so that the overall density of the trash in the container is relatively low. This is especially true of construction debris, which is composed of juxtaposed wood, paper and metal products. Accordingly, the waste capacity of the container is typically limited not by the weight of the filled container (which is usually limited only by the rules on the gross vehicle weight (GVW) of the container-bearing truck and on the transport thereof over public streets and highways), but rather by the interior volume of the container. Due to the high cost involved in the transport of a container to and from the waste disposal site, transport of a volume-limited container is not as efficient as transport of a weight-limited container.
Bergmann, U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,426,925 and 4,467,714, both of which are incorporated herein by reference, disclose apparatus for compacting the trash in such an upwardly open container. These patents disclose a heavy compacting roller which moves to-and-fro on the trash in a container to compact the trash. The compacting roller is mounted on the free end of a pivot arm supported in an articulated manner from a post so that the compacting roller can rotate reciprocatingly and thereby drive itself back and forth over the trash within the container. The post on which the pivot arm (and hence the compacting roller) is mounted is located outside of the open top container, generally closely adjacent either a short end or long side of the container. While such systems effect economies by reducing the number of trips required between the container site and the waste disposal or landfill site (because the container filled with compacted trash contains a much greater weight of trash), such economies are partially offset by the expense involved in dedicating a compactor to each open top container.
More recently, in order to allow for amortization of the cost of the compactor over a number of open top containers at a given collection site, a compactor embodiment having limited mobility over tracks laid in the given collection site has been used to service a plurality of open top containers in the given collection site. External means are used to cause movement of the somewhat mobile compactor embodiment back and forth along the tracks to enable successive servicing of a plurality of open top containers disposed, one after the other, along one side of the tracks in the given collection site.
The degree of amortization provided by the somewhat mobile embodiment is limited by the number of open top containers which would normally be present at any collection site. Typically, the number of open top containers at a collection site does not provide full-time use of a compactor and thus limits the degree of amortization possible. Further, even the limited degree of amortization possible with the somewhat mobile embodiment comes at the price of a centralization of the waste containers at a given waste collection location. In a relatively large business or manufacturing plant of the type which might require a number of open top containers, the waste may be produced at a variety of different locations and then have to be transported to the given collection site containing the open top containers. The result of such a system is a bottleneck at the given collection site as waste is brought there from various other points in the plant as well as the need for an additional layer of transport facilities simply to transport the waste from the various locations at the plant where it is produced to the given collection site where the tracks and the compactor are located.
Accordingly, it is an object of the present invention to provide in one preferred embodiment a fully mobile trash pulverizer suitable for travel on a public street or highway between a plurality of remote trash collection sites having open top containers.
Another object is to provide such a pulverizer which in one preferred embodiment is self-propelled and lawful for use on public streets and highways connecting remote trash collection sites.
A further object is to provide such a pulverizer which in one preferred embodiment has a cost that is amortizable over a plurality of open top containers disposed at a plurality of remote collection sites and does not require a central collection site in a large plant.
It is also an object to provide such a pulverizer which is simple and inexpensive to manufacture, use and maintain.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
It has now been found that the above and related objects of the present invention are obtained in a mobile trash pulverizer for shredding, redistributing and compacting trash in an open top container. The pulverizer comprises a self-propelled vehicle for travel on a public street or highway between a plurality of remote sites having open top containers containing trash to be pulverized. A rotatable, generally cylindrical, heavy roller defines a pair of opposed ends and a circumferential surface connecting the ends, the roller having a plurality of spaced apart cutters (e.g., blades) projecting outwardly from the circumferential surface for pulverizing trash during rotation of the roller. Means are provided for reversibly rotating the roller. Pivot arm means is carried by the vehicle for supporting and moving the roller between a transport orientation, wherein the roller is on the vehicle with the weight of the roller being substantially borne by the vehicle, and a use orientation, wherein the roller is in an open top container with the weight of the roller being substantially borne by the trash within the open top container, whereby rotation of the roller causes the roller to move along the interior length of the open top container and thereby shred, redistribute and compact trash therein.
Preferably, the pulverizer effects a 5:1 volumetric compaction of trash, the roller having a weight of at least 1,000 lbs, preferably at least 1½ tons, and an axial length of about 6 feet.
In a preferred embodiment, the pivot arm means comprises a stationary mast having a first end fixedly secured to the vehicle and a second end projecting distally upwardly thereof, a first arm having a first end pivotally secured to the second end of the mast and a second end extending distally thereof, and a second arm having a first end pivotally secured to the second end of the first arm and a second end extending distally thereof and secured to the roller. Preferably, the pulverizer additionally includes means for enabling limited free pivotal movement of the second arm relative to the first arm and the first arm relative to the mast, such that the roller can move to-and-fro along the interior length of the open top container. The pivot arm means is configured and dimensioned to enable the roller to move to-and-fro along substantially the entire interior length of the container at the height of the interior flo
Amster Rothstein & Ebenstein
Rosenbaum Mark
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