New uses for old tires

New uses for old tires TIRES/WHEELS New Uses 13-1-1 "I've discovered some fantastic new uses for old tires that turn them into valuable assets instead of an annoying nuisance," says Dave Geister, a farmer from Prescott, Wis., who's become an expert at finding ways to put discarded old tires to use around the farm. Two and a half years ago Geister acquired a 1 1n acre quarry filled with about 600,000 old tires and then set out to find ways to put them to work around the farm. He's been so successful at finding new uses, including culverts, fencing,.. walk-ways, tow cables, hay stack tie-downs, snow fences, erosion control, etc., that he's received a $15,000 research grant from the state of Wisconsin to test his new techniques and to develop even more ideas. Heading the list of more than 60 new uses Geister has found to "turn old tires into money" is soil erosion control. "Farmers want to take care of the land but, in many cases, they just can't justify the expense. Tires offer an inexpensive and simple solution for helping to save our streams, lakes and groundwater. My methods cost about 10 to 15 cents per square foot. It takes about 6,000 old tires to rehabilitate a modest-sized gully. Tires work better than metal, concrete, or wood because they won't rust, rot or crack and using tires costs only a fraction of the cost of conventional methods. " Geister uses steel-belted radials for most of his erosion control projects because they're more durable than bias ply tires. He cuts off one or both sidewalls and ties the tires together with banding straps. To fill a gully, for example, he places the tires in layers and fills them with a layer of dirt before laying in another layer of tires. He stakes down every other layer, and continues laying in tires and dirt until the gully is built back up to field level. "Cutting off the sidewall allows more soil into the tires, eliminating air entrapment which allows tires to `float' upward through soil. Banding straps hold them tightly together so water won't flow between them," says Geister, noting that in one gully that was 70 ft. wide by 110-ft. long, he used a whopping 20,000 tires. He uses the same "open sidewall" technique to build "berms" which work like dikes to retard water flow. "Tire berms work as good as tree roots to permanently stop field and barnyard runoff. They're inexpensive and easy to build. Animals can't tunnel through them so the tires can't wash out, and they don't take up a lot of precious topsoil." Geister notes that in most states there are laws regulating use of old tires. Geister says farmers should check with their local county extension office to learn what laws apply in their states. "The great thing about using tires is their availability. And with landfills charging $2 to $3 per tire, service stations and other outlets gladly pay to have tires hauled away," he says. Geister has designed and built his own tire-slicing machines to cut bias-ply tires into 1/2 to 1-in. wide rubber strips. The strips are used to make such products as tow ropes, mats, horse corral fences, dog leashes, and rubber tie-downs for round bales. Another of his machines simply cuts oot the sidewalls on tires so he can use either the rubber sidewall rings or the tread for projects. Geister also built a "rubber rock" ma-chine out of an old flywheel forage harvester that uses the cutting knives in a for-age harvester to cut tires up into small 2-in. chunks for use in driveways, walkways, playgrounds, stall bedding, and so on. The machine is powered by its own motor and a conveyor feeds rubber into it. The speed of the conveyor regulates the size of the chunks. A separation screen and recutter determine chunk size. Geister is building a larger commercial machine out of an old New Holland swather that has three seperate cutting mechanisms. One can cut off a sidewall in 5 sec., another cuts the tread into 2 in. wide strips and the third cuts the tire strips into chunks. Geister says the high-capacity machine can be hauled directly to tire dumps for on-site processing. At this time Geister h

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