This is Devon --
A family-run scrap metal merchant has invested more than £500,000 in two groundbreaking smelting furnaces that will turn old car parts into ingots of aluminium.
The investment will see WH Orchard & Sons generate a new revenue stream, selling the ingots on to manufacturers across the UK and even Europe.
The business has acquired two furnaces which are a first-of-a-kind in the UK, with 150 guests including potential buyers from as far afield as Germany attending their big switch-on, last Friday.
One furnace melts down "dirty" scrap – such as car engines and gear boxes, while the other is used for smelting cleaner aluminium, such as alloy wheels and window frames. Their chimneys are fitted with filters which monitor the waste output. These pump smoke back into the furnaces, in a cycle which results in just a heat-haze eventually being emitted into the atmosphere.
The smelters are fuelled by recycled oil and brake fluid pumped out of the old cars bought as scrap.
Orchards, based in Dobwalls, had formerly sold the scrap material recovered in its processes to a Birmingham-based company.
But when the latter was sold four years ago, the third-generation Cornish business found it difficult to establish a relationship with its new owners on a similar footing.
Things came to a climax, when the Orchards said that it would cut out the middleman and go it alone.
"They said we'd never have the knowledge, money or get the planning permission to do it," said Graham Orchard, who runs the business with his father, William.
"Well, when you tell a Cornishman that, that's all the incentive he needs to do it."
Since then, the company stockpiled all its scrap, including 2,650 cars it acquired through the Government's temporary car scrappage scheme introduced in 2009.
Mr Orchard said that the market for its ingots would generate a return upon the business's capital investment within two years; with the end-product also reducing the haulage costs formerly incurred transporting scrap to the Midlands, by two-thirds.
Until now, the father and son have run their business alone, but have now taken on two employees to man the furnaces.
Mr Orchard said that scrap metal sourced from Cornwall alone would be enough to keep the smelters in full-time operation.
While he has no current plans to increase the size of the operation, he hopes that the recycling facility will shine a light on what his business is setting out to achieve and help clamp down on what he describes as "cowboy operations" in the scrap industry.
He also thanked South East Cornwall MP Sheryll Murray – who was among guests at the company's launch day – for her support.
The MP said: "I am so proud that South East Cornwall has fantastic innovative business people like the Orchards." Reported by This is 4 hours ago.
A family-run scrap metal merchant has invested more than £500,000 in two groundbreaking smelting furnaces that will turn old car parts into ingots of aluminium.
The investment will see WH Orchard & Sons generate a new revenue stream, selling the ingots on to manufacturers across the UK and even Europe.
The business has acquired two furnaces which are a first-of-a-kind in the UK, with 150 guests including potential buyers from as far afield as Germany attending their big switch-on, last Friday.
One furnace melts down "dirty" scrap – such as car engines and gear boxes, while the other is used for smelting cleaner aluminium, such as alloy wheels and window frames. Their chimneys are fitted with filters which monitor the waste output. These pump smoke back into the furnaces, in a cycle which results in just a heat-haze eventually being emitted into the atmosphere.
The smelters are fuelled by recycled oil and brake fluid pumped out of the old cars bought as scrap.
Orchards, based in Dobwalls, had formerly sold the scrap material recovered in its processes to a Birmingham-based company.
But when the latter was sold four years ago, the third-generation Cornish business found it difficult to establish a relationship with its new owners on a similar footing.
Things came to a climax, when the Orchards said that it would cut out the middleman and go it alone.
"They said we'd never have the knowledge, money or get the planning permission to do it," said Graham Orchard, who runs the business with his father, William.
"Well, when you tell a Cornishman that, that's all the incentive he needs to do it."
Since then, the company stockpiled all its scrap, including 2,650 cars it acquired through the Government's temporary car scrappage scheme introduced in 2009.
Mr Orchard said that the market for its ingots would generate a return upon the business's capital investment within two years; with the end-product also reducing the haulage costs formerly incurred transporting scrap to the Midlands, by two-thirds.
Until now, the father and son have run their business alone, but have now taken on two employees to man the furnaces.
Mr Orchard said that scrap metal sourced from Cornwall alone would be enough to keep the smelters in full-time operation.
While he has no current plans to increase the size of the operation, he hopes that the recycling facility will shine a light on what his business is setting out to achieve and help clamp down on what he describes as "cowboy operations" in the scrap industry.
He also thanked South East Cornwall MP Sheryll Murray – who was among guests at the company's launch day – for her support.
The MP said: "I am so proud that South East Cornwall has fantastic innovative business people like the Orchards." Reported by This is 4 hours ago.