With the rising population and an accompanied expansion of the economy across the world, the ecosystem has been strained over the years resulting in depletion and degradation of natural resources. Thus, protection of the environment has always been adopted to create a balance in the population basic needs and development. One of the ways to achieve this balance is recycling of beverage aluminium cans, which have become the backbone of industrial production (Becker, Ponce, Rodríguez, Vázquez and Ponce 2017, p. 151). However, recycling machines that are available such as pneumatic, hydraulic, and mechanical types are very expensive and are larger in size, making it difficult to operate. To solve this problem, new designed can crusher machines have been invented with multi crashing ability (Husain and Sheikh 2015, p. 2278). A can crusher refers to the tool used to dismantle or squash aluminium beverage cans to enable easier storage in the recycle bins.
The can crusher functions in the Scotch yoke mechanism of reciprocating motion, whereby linear motion is converted into a rotational motion severally. According to Creveling, Slutsky and Antis (2002, p. 37), the other reciprocating part is attached to a sliding yoke and a slot, which controls a pin on the rotating sides. As the crusher motor rotates, it moves the smaller and secondary pulleys that are connected to the shaft. This movement keeps the main pulley in motion thereby rotating the disk which further rotates the collar (Bugtai et al., p. 7). As cans move into the system, the collar movement pushes the slotted plate to begin reciprocating and the connected rods crush the cans. Once the crashing is complete, the cans are passed through rectangular slots and get disposed in the waste bins (Plunkert 2006, p. 28; Esparragoza 2012, p.3). Since this process takes a very short time, it can be implemented in mass production. They can, therefore, be used at home as well as in hotels and events where there is mass production of beverage cans.
The design of can crushers is made in a way that they are able to crush beverage cans for further recycling. This idea was adopted to encourage the development of recycling programs that can create opportunities for individuals to learn how to conserve natural resources, environmental issues, and economics of supply/demand (Buza, Buza and Pllana 2014, p.181). As such, the design of the can crusher was aimed at: inciting individuals to collect cans; assist youths and children to crush the collected cans; increasing the ease and efficiency of use; and enabling easy transportation of the crashed cans (Pankaj, Qais, Saif, Jafar and Nadeem 2015, p.754). Uncompressed cans consume a lot of disposal spaces particularly for cans with 16 oz. or more. The crusher has the ability to compress these products into an inch; for instance, a can with a size of 16 oz., which is approximately 9 inches in height would be compressed 9 times its original size (Sontakke, Yadav, Wakchaure, Samere and Agte 2016, p. 220). This way, room can be creating for disposing 9 more cans.
The current crushing machinery observed had been created through the improvement of the traditional electric motors or steam engines. The first roll crusher that was created existed in 1906, and in 1958 Blake invented the jaw crusher, which was used to crush rocks. According to Botre, Birajdar, Thakare and Munde (2017, p. 2375), through series of development, the United States later came up with the gyratory crusher in 1878 that further enhanced the efficiency of production. Up to the 1970s, automatic controller was developed to control hydraulic crusher (Sontakke, Yadav, Wakchaure, Samere and Agte 2016, p. 221). Such improvements led to the redesign of the crushers to a more efficient tool with big crushing ratio, less consumed energy, and environmental conservation.
References
Becker, J., Ponce, C., Rodríguez, J., Vázquez, D. and Ponce, H., 2017. Can crush: An automated waste compacting system for public areas. In Humanitarian Technology Conference (MHTC), IEEE Mexican (pp. 149-152). IEEE. DOI: 10.1109/MHTC.2017.7926206
Botre, I., Birajdar, B., Thakare, P. and Munde, K., 2017. Review and modeling of aluminium can recycling system using pneumatic system. International Research Journal of Engineering and Technology, 4(5), pp. 2378-2381.
Bugtai, N.T., Cham, A.K.B., Fong, E.V.Y., Serrano, T.A., Syki, H.C. and Yu, G.S., 2009. Development of an automated reverse vending aluminum cans crusher. The Science and Technology 2009 Congress and DLSU - Osaka University Workshop, DLSU-Manila, September 21-23 (pp.1-9).
Buza, S.S.A., Buza, S.K.A. and Pllana, B.K., 2014. Can crusher design in response to environmental concerns. Journal of Trends in the Development of Machinery and Associated Technology, 18(1), pp. 179-182.
Creveling, C.M., Slutsky, J. and Antis, D., 2002. Design for Six Sigma in technology and product development. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall Professional.
Esparragoza, I.E., 2012. Enhancing global social responsibility through multinational collaborative design projects. Refereed Paper#16, 10th Latin American and Caribbean Conference for Engineering and Technology; Panama City, Panama., pp. 1-10.
Husain, S. and Sheikh, M.S., 2015. Can crusher machine using scotch yoke mechanism. IOSR Journal of Mechanical and Civil Engineering (IOSR-JMCE) e-ISSN, pp.2278-1684.
Pankaj, S., Qais, S., Saif, S., Jafar, S. and Nadeem, S. 2015. Fully automatic can crusher. International Journal of Engineering Sciences " Emerging Technologies, 7(5), pp. 753-760.
Plunkert, P.A., 2006. Aluminum recycling in the United States in 2000. US Department of the Interior, US Geological Survey.
Sontakke, K., Yadav, H., Wakchaure, C., Samere, P. and Agte, K.P., 2016. Design and fabrication of automatic can crusher. Imperial Journal of Interdisciplinary Research, 2(7), pp.219-223.
