Recycling of Concrete Rail Sleepers
Up to any challenge –
RESOURCE-EFFICIENT AND COST-EFFECTIVE
Several million concrete sleepers are replaced across Germany and Europe every year to keep the rail network safe and reliable. They are made of high-quality concrete — with reinforcing bars, L-shaped steel, pipes and other materials embedded in them, depending on the country and design. On top of that, they often contain “impurities” such as wood and metal that need to be separated during recycling.
The machine shown is not specifically designed for processing railway sleepers. For demonstration purposes, the railway sleepers were therefore cut in half.
Up to any challenge –
WE HAVE THE SOLUTIONS
Recycling concrete rail sleepers comes with a long list of challenges. Our roller crushers offer a proven and cost-effective answer to every one of them.
efficient handling of long sleepers
The high iron content in and on the sleepers normally causes significant wear on crushing equipment. Our roller crushers run at low rotational speeds with high torque — keeping wear rates very low compared to other crushing methods.
low wear
The high iron content in and on the sleepers results in significant wear on the crushing equipment. Our roller crushers operate at low rotational speeds with high torque, ensuring very low wear rates compared to other crushing methods.
no machine damage or downtime
A high share of filler and sand makes the recycled concrete hard to use — and undermines the economics of sleeper recycling. Our roll crushers process the material gently and deliver a recycled concrete aggregate with a high share of valuable fractions and minimal sand and fines.
gentle crushing - high-quality fines
A high proportion of filler and sand makes it difficult to recycle the concrete and reduces the cost-effectiveness of recycling the sleepers. Our roll crushers crush the material gently, ensuring a high proportion of high-quality aggregates in the recycled concrete aggregate with minimal fines and sand content.
easy separation of impurities
High-speed crushers tend to break contaminants such as plastic or wood into pieces so small that they can hardly be removed from the recycled material. The gentle crushing action of our roller crusher keeps these contaminants at a usable size — and they can be separated easily.
clean separation of concrete and steel
Our roll crushers expose nearly 100% of the tension rods — the basis for a truly clean separation of concrete and steel.
High-quality secondary raw material
MADE FROM CONCRETE RAILROAD SLEEPERS
Our DRC series double-roll crushers are used in sleeper recycling. With hydraulic gap adjustment and overload protection, they are ideally suited for turning decommissioned sleepers into high-quality secondary raw materials, with final particle sizes below 80 mm.
For high-quality further processing into granules below 16 mm — ready to be used as concrete aggregate — we recommend our SGC series.
A throughput of 150 t/h or more is realistic. The actual rate depends mainly on how quickly the operator can feed the sleepers into the crusher with a grab. The roller crusher is available in both stationary and mobile versions.
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APPLICATIONS FOR ROLL CRUSHERS
The right solution for your process requirements
