Abstract
The triboelectric effect is a phenomenon whereby certain materials acquire an electrical charge after coming into contact with one another. Currently, there are no published methods for the separation of paper from a mixture of paper and high-density polyethylene (HDPE) flakes using only the triboelectric effect (i.e. without the use of high-voltage electricity). A belt separator concept, in which a brush tribocharges the belt and creates an electric charge to which paper is attracted to, was used as the basis for the investigation. Two belt (“plate”) materials and two brush materials were evaluated to determine which combination resulted in the largest amount of paper collected. Also, the effects of flake and plate tribocharging time were evaluated. The results showed that the polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) plate tribocharged with the polyurethane brush attracted the most paper. Tribocharging time of the flake mixture did not have a noticeable effect on the separation of paper from the mixture. However, a dramatic increase in the amount of paper collected with plate tribocharging times from zero to ten seconds was observed.