Singleton Birch boost their efficiency with new Doppstadt AK 315

Singleton Birch Ltd have been operating for over 200 years and have established themselves as the UK’s leading independent lime supplier. In more recent times, the company has diversified into various different sectors through the creation of Birch Lime, Birch Energy, Birch Chemicals, Birch Solutions and Birch Waste.

Birch Energy is an expert in anaerobic digestion, specialising in the design, construction and operation of anaerobic digestion plants, and developing renewable energy projects.

To maximise the gas yield of the product going into their anaerobic digestion plants they shred the material to increase the surface area. The company were previously using an older tub grinder to process this material, however, following a successful demo of a Doppstadt AK 315 high-speed shredder from Blue Machinery (Central), Singleton Birch were able to improve their operation significantly.

The company are using their new high-speed shredder to process a variety of materials including potatoes, sugar beet and horse manure. The 315 is the smallest mobile shredder in the AK series, featuring a Stage V 310 hp MTU engine. This state-of-the-art engine features electronic torque optimisation for high torque coupled with low fuel consumption. Its large slow running fan ensures a low noise operation.

The AK 315 is a highly versatile compact machine that is suitable for use on a wide range of materials including waste wood, green waste, organic waste, tree stumps, root wood and fine shredding of SRF (solid recovered fuels). Singleton Birch’s machine is fitted with free-swinging hammers to ensure that any contaminants such as tramp material does not cause damage to the machine, which is essential in this application. The free-swinging hammers have individual easily replaceable tips that can be adjusted to suit the type of materials that needs to be grinded.

The Doppstadt high-speed shredder has allowed the customer to improve their efficiency through increased tonnage and lower fuel consumption. Alistair Forman, Contracting Sales Manager at Singleton Birch Ltd comments “We have known Sean and the guys at Blue Central for a number of years now following on from our previous purchase of a Doppstadt DM mixer. We decided it was time to bring in a new shredder to process our material and although we looked at a few options, we knew that the Doppstadt machines are reliable, and Blue had one readily available so it worked out very well in the end. Since we have been using the new AK 315 we have massively increased our throughput, when compared to the old machine this new shredder is getting through four days’ worth of material in just a single day.”