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What does recycled content mean?
To reuse materials that otherwise
would have been thrown away; to pass through a process once again; to
recondition and adapt spent materials to a new use or function.
What
are castings?
A casting is a metal part formed
by pouring molten iron, steel, aluminum, zinc, titanium, magnesium, copper,
brass, bronze or cobalt, in nearly all cases from recycled materials, into a
mold or dies. Virtually any metal that can be melted can and is cast. Casted
products are typically machined or heat-treated and used as components of
assembled products.
Castings come from foundries that
employ cutting edge technologies and the highest levels of productivity and
quality available. A majority of casting companies are small and medium-sized
businesses. These foundries fulfill a specialty niche, casting unique products
or filling small be highly customized orders.
Recycled content and our cast products
Jay R. Smith Mfg. Co.®
deals with over 20 different foundries and their practices are different based
on the foundry. All of the foundries we deal with use scrap material. It would
be safe to say that over 85% of the material used is scrap material. Of the
scrap material it is estimated that 90-95% is post industrial with the balance
being post-consumer.
From the earliest of times the
metal casting process has taken otherwise useless scrap metal and turned it into
a usable, highly valued product. Old and discarded products such as appliances,
sewer grates, cans, cars and water meters are not trash; they contain the key
raw material for metal castings.
As a result, the industry saves
neighborhood landfills from 13 million tons of material each year. In addition,
sand casting operations internally use and reuse molding media.
All Jay R. Smith Mfg. Co.®
castings are sand castings. After extended use, only 6% must be discarded, with
much of it going for beneficial reuse projects (cement manufacturing, road
barriers, bricks and pavers, asphalt and construction fill), minimizing
environmental impact for raw materials.
We hope that this overview of
recycled content and castings explains the domestic cast iron foundry business
and will assist you in specifying and using Jay R. Smith Mfg. Co.®
products for your projects.
For more information about our cast iron products,
click here.
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used in conjunction with 
used in a collection system filter captured rainwater and helps maintain the health
of the storage tank. Water collected is available for use in potable and non-potable applications such as toilet
and/or urinal flushing, laundries, mechanical systems, custodial uses, site irrigation and for bathing water.
