The cold has (temporary?) left us here in Sweden, but the district heating and power plants still need woodchips. We visited a terminal where miles of piles are transferred into environmentally friendly fuels for the freezing Swedes. 
Efficient chipping
There are all kinds of chippers out there. We write about them every now and then. Here below, you will find links to some of the articles that we wrote about chippers.
When I was working with the Elmia Wood show there was always one chipper stand, among many, that was easy to find. That was the CBI stand, and the reason was that their machines made much more noise than any other. I asked the owner/founder back then, Anders Ragnarsson, why that is. He said it was because they were much faster in the infeed and also the rotor was faster, all to make it more efficient. That´s why it is so noisy. And honestly – it wasn´t the engine that made the noise, it was the chipper itself.
Ragnarsson loved to start a CBI chipper up as some neighboring competitor was demonstrating, just to show how much faster the chip pile grew under the CBI compared to the other one. He never admitted that he loved it, but I´m sure he did.
Nowadays CBI (Continental Biomass Industries) is owned by Terex and Ragnarsson is working with other projects. However, the CBI machines are still there. I visited one of them at a terminal where tons of woodchips for fuel is produced every day.
CBI 8400
The CBI Magnum Force Chipper 8400 is one of the largest chippers you can find. An infeed of 120 x 120 cm (47” x 47”) and a 1100 hp engine makes it extremely efficient. The one we visited is pulled by a 500 hp Volvo truck. On the truck, an Epsilon truck crane is mounted to feed the chipper. A wheel loader moves the chips away from under the conveyor, so that that the chipper doesn´t have to be moved more often than necessary. After all, the CBI 8400 is built to produce chips, not to roll around on the terminals.
The 8400 chippers can be converted into a grinder with CBI’s quick-change rotor and screen system. The owner of this machine, TM Kross in Sweden, have both CBI chippers and grinders in their fleet, and also an Albach chipper.
The material that was chipped here was second grade logs that are not desired by the saw- or paper mills. The chips will be used to produce district heating and electricity in a CHP plant somewhere in south Sweden. There are quite a few such plants to choose from. Shortly, you will be able to read about one of them here at NordicWoodJournal.com, so make sure to visit us regularly.
A wide range of machines
CBI offers a wide range of chippers and grinders for forestry, recycling and organic recycling. You will find more information on the CBI home-page here.
As mentioned above there are quite a few chippers out there. Here are some of the articles that we wrote about chippers:
ERJO remote controlled chipper
Allan Bruks – Pioneer in the forest
Film and photos
Here is a short film from my visit at the terminal:
and here are some more photos:
Film and photos: Per Jonsson
