Chip Card Sorting Machine Segregating Materials
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Solution Overview
Problem
Current recycling methods for chip card waste result in significant material losses and inefficient recycling due to the mixture of plastics and metals, where metals contaminate plastic recycling processes and plastics are not recycled as they are incinerated, violating recycling regulations.
Innovation Solution
A machine with a cutting module, separate collectors, and a grinder that cuts and separates chip card materials into metallic, plastic, and polluting elements, ensuring effective destruction and recycling by directing each material type to specialized channels, preserving the intrinsic qualities of plastics and maintaining security.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Productivity
If shredded cards are processed in large volumes by type of plastic in a common flow with other waste, then plastic recycling volume is increased, but metals and impurities contaminate the plastic recycling process requiring frequent filter changes
Solution Approach 1:
The invention divides the recycling stream into separate channels for different materials. A sorting system with multiple collectors separates plastic, metal, and polluting elements into distinct flows, preventing metal contamination of the plastic recycling stream while maintaining high processing volumes.
2Quantity of substance
If shredded material is sent to precious metal recycling channels, then metal recovery is achieved, but plastics are incinerated instead of recycled violating recycling regulations
Solution Approach 1:
The system separates plastic and metal into different collection streams. Plastic elements are directed to plastic recycling channels while metal elements go to precious metal recycling channels, allowing both materials to be recycled through their respective specialized channels without contamination.
Solution Approach 2:
The sorting system acts as an intermediary between the shredded material and the recycling channels. It mediates the separation process, directing each material type to the appropriate channel, preventing plastics from being incinerated while enabling metal recovery.
3Reliability
If indiscriminate shredding is performed to ensure security, then confidential information is destroyed, but material qualities are lost and recycling efficiency decreases
Solution Approach 1:
Instead of uniform shredding, the system uses selective cutting to remove only specific polluting elements (chip, magnetic stripe, hologram) while preserving the plastic substrate. This segmented approach maintains material qualities for recycling while ensuring security through targeted destruction of confidential elements.
Solution Approach 2:
The cutting module applies localized destruction only to specific zones containing confidential information (chip area, magnetic stripe location, hologram position). The rest of the plastic card maintains its intrinsic qualities and structural integrity for efficient recycling.
4Reliability
If complete shredding-grinding is performed to ensure security, then confidential elements are destroyed, but material losses increase and recycling becomes less efficient
Solution Approach 1:
The invention extracts only the polluting and confidential elements (chip, magnetic stripe, hologram) from the plastic card through selective cutting. The plastic substrate is separated and preserved for recycling, minimizing material losses while ensuring complete destruction of confidential information in the extracted elements.
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
The machine optimizes material sorting and recycling, reducing material losses and greenhouse gas emissions by up to 92% for recycled plastics, and significantly lowering the carbon footprint compared to producing virgin plastics, while ensuring secure destruction of confidential information.
Implementation Method 1
a grinder arranged between the cutting module and the collector to collect the metallic cut elements, this grinder being intended to grind any metallic cut element going into this collector in order to ensure the immediate destruction of the physical and logical confidential information contained in the chip
Implementation Method 2
a cutting module suitable for cutting at least one element in a predefined zone of the chip card introduced into the machine
Data Source
Figure 1~2
Figure 3~4
Figure 5~7
AI summary
The present invention relates to a sorting machine for separating chip card waste, comprising: - a cutting module (8) able to cut at least one element in a predefined zone of the chip card introduced into the machine, - at least three separate collectors (10, 11, 12) for receiving, respectively, harmful cut elements, metal cut elements and plastic cut elements, - a sorting module (9) for directing the cut element to one of said at least three collectors, and - a mill (13) disposed between the cutting module and the collector for receiving the metal cut elements, this mill being intended to crush any metal cut element entering this collector.