Patent ID: 7325757

Claim:
A system for processing materials in a waste stream, comprising: an arrangement of separators and a grinder, the separators and grinder being configured in the arrangement to produce three or more product streams from a plastic-rich feed mixture, wherein the plastic-rich feed mixture includes plastic and metal from automobiles, appliances or electronics and with an average particle size from 10 mm to 200 mm and the product streams include a coarse heavy stream, a ground plastic-rich product stream, and at least one ground light material stream; wherein the arrangement comprises: an air-leg separator as one of the separators separating metal materials from the plastic-rich feed mixture, wherein the air-leg separator is configured to receive the plastic-rich feed mixture and to entrain light materials and allow heavy materials to fall through the air-leg separator, the grinder in operable communication with the air-leg separator such that at least a portion of a plastic material exiting the separator enters the grinder, a subsequent separator as one of the separators in operable communication with the grinder, the subsequent separator being configured to receive a ground material stream from the grinder and to separate at least one ground light material stream from the ground material; and a metal reprocessing apparatus for reprocessing the metal materials derived from the heavy stream.