Offloading The Life Of Your Vertical Baler

Getting The Most Out Of Your Vertical Baler

Your business just invested in a new recycling baler to help reduce waste, improve work area safety, and create recycling revenue.  That’s a great step to improving operational efficiency and environmental stewardship!

To protect your new investment, your employees need to be properly trained on how to install, set up, operate, and maintain the baler.

Harmony Enterprises provides an extensive owner’s manual with the purchase of each baler for this purpose.  Each manual does a great job of explaining what is required to get the most out of your recycling baler while keeping your employees safe and equipment lasting for a long time.

In addition to using your baler to recycle the types and sizes of commodities for which it was specified, users should take special care not to offload recyclables into the chamber of the baler.  Offloading can significantly reduce the life of the baler and pose a safety risk to your employees.

What Is Offloading?

Offloading is an industry term that refers to the way that recyclable commodities like cardboard, paper, plastic, and aluminum are loaded into the chamber of a baler.

While offloading, operators stack product unevenly onto one side, the front, or rear of the baler chamber and cycle the machine.  Harmony Enterprises strongly recommends that baler operators do not offload material into the baler, but rather, carefully load the baler evenly from side to side, and front to back, prior to each cycle.

Offloading a baler can lead to several significant problems for your business that may cause baler damage, down time, or injury.

Here are some of the negative consequences of offloading a baler:

• Wear Pads – offloading a baler results in uneven wear and tear on wear pads in the chamber of the baler.  This not only reduces the life and effectiveness of the wear pads, but can lead to issues with other components of the baler.
• Platen Movement – when products are pushed unevenly to one side versus the other in a baler, the platen (or ram) may be forced to compact the material while being tilted in the opposite direction, causing unnecessary strain on the baler.
• Hydraulics – excessive offloading a baler can lead to costly hydraulic leaks.
• Cylinder Life – with the unnecessary strain on the hydraulic system and platen, there is a natural decrease in the life expectancy of the baler cylinder.  Having to replace a baler cylinder can be expensive, in addition to the negative impacts of your machine being down while it is being repaired.
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  Even, dense bales are easier to transport and store. They are safer to stack and recoup greater recycling revenue with higher weight.

  Changes In Bale Size And Weight – offloading changes the overall shape of the bale when it is tied off.  Parts of the bale may sit higher than others, and the bale looks like it is “tilted”.  Because the bale is not filled out properly, desired weights are often not achieved due to a lack of bale density. Reduced bale weights can lead to reduced revenue.

• Difficulty Transporting/Stacking – bales that are uneven in shape and size are harder to transport and stack for storage.  Recyclers prefer even cube shaped bales that can be neatly stacked to save space in trucks and cargo containers.
• Employee Safety – if all of these reasons are not enough, one of the most important is the safety risk that offloading can pose to your employees.  Uneven bales that are stacked can fall over, causing serious injury to workers.

Due to all of these factors, it is Harmony Enterprises’ policy that offloading material into your vertical baler may result in your baler warranty being voided. Please refer to your baler owner’s manual for more information, or contact Harmony Customer Service by phone at 888-474-2253 or by email at [email protected]

How Can We Help?

Harmony Enterprises is the solutions provider for waste handling and recycling. We offer wide range of innovative solutions to meet the specific needs of each customer and their operations.  We follow our Proven Process to ensure seamless implementation of our solutions and customer satisfaction as part of our true partnership approach.

If you are looking for additional training resources on how to properly make a bale, please share this instructional video on How To Make A Perfect Cardboard Bale.

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If you would like to learn more about our full line of vertical balers, horizontal balers, or liquid extraction balers, contact our professional sales team at [email protected] or by filling out this simple form.