green wheels


Tyre Disposal and Recycling
November 14, 2007, 8:04 am
Filed under: alternative energy, carbon, eco, environment, footprint, lpg, trading

It is now standard practice for tyre retailers to impose a tyre
disposal charge when you change your tyres, which tends typically to be
about £1.00 a tyre. You may wonder why you have to pay this charge -
after all tyre disposal charges have not always been the norm.

The real answer to this question is that it is a simple case of
economics – a case of supply and demand. Going back twenty years the
scrap disposal scenario was totally different to the way it is today.
It used to be the case that car tyre retreading companies would collect
the majority of used tyres as the raw material for their production.
They used to pick up the used tyres free of charge (or even pay for the
privilege).

However, that was when over 4 million retreaded car tyres were sold in
the UK every year. In the meantime the market for British manufactured
retreads has been squeezed by cheap new tyres from the Far East to the
point where the UK market is no more than a tenth of what it was. This
means that retreaders no longer pick up the scrap tyres. This is done
by professional tyre disposal companies who need to charge the retailer
for this service.

Much of the tyre disposal in the UK is now carried out by members of
the Responsible Recyclers Scheme, which is now administered under
license by the Tyre Recovery Association. Members of the scheme
guarantee that the tyres collected are disposed of in an
environmentally friendly method, whether recycled or used as a fuel in
cement kilns. As a guarantee, members of the scheme are subject to a
stringent audit process conducted regularly by independent
environmental audit specialists.

The Responsible Recyclers Scheme also promotes best practice in the
tyre recovery industry and helps protect against the continuing scourge
of fly-tipping.

In the UK around 40 million tyres are taken off car, vans, trucks and
buses every year, a total of 440,000 tonnes. That is a huge amount of
scrap to dispose of and it has to be paid for somehow. Although the UK
tyre recovery industry currently has enough capacity to cope with scrap
tyre arisings, the balance between overcapacity and undercapacity is
relatively fine.

Of key importance in the tyre disposal market in the UK is The Landfill
Directive, which was adopted by the UK in July 1999. This banned the
disposal of whole tyres by landfill from July 2003 and shredded tyres
from July 2006. This has changed the entire scenario of how tyres are
disposed of and recycled in the UK and Europe. There are a number of
ways in which scrap tyres are recycled in the UK although all of these
can be defined as either reuse, recycling or recovery.

Retreading is still considered to be one of the most preferable method
of tyre recycling as it effectively doubles the life of the new tyre,
reducing the numbers of new tyres needed and thereby minimising waste.
Retread still make up nearly half of all truck tyres on the road but
the number of car tyres that are retreaded is now relatively small.

Other common uses for scrap tyres include sports and recreational
surfaces, landfill engineering, carpet underlay/floor coverings, and
road building. Roads manufactured using crumb rubber last longer, have
better traction and reduce noise.

In the UK scrap tyres are also widely used as a fuel in cement kilns as an alternative to the traditional fuel, coal.

About Author :
Article produced by BlackCircles.com – discount tyres for cars, 4×4s, and commercial fleets in the UK. Tyres can be ordered online and fitted at your local garage.

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Source: http://www.a1articles.com/article_189095_53.html

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Buying your lpg car on ebay…? Pt. 2 of 3
November 12, 2007, 11:07 am
Filed under: buying and selling, dual fuel, ebay, lpg, safety, trading, web

In this second instalment I want to look at just how you track down your perfect car on ebay – what your options are and how you can make the whole process more efficient.

As I’ve said previously – ebay is now one of the biggest auto markets online and really is just as good a place to start your search for a new car as auto-trader, exchange and mart, etc..

You may think that a prime reason for starting off with one of these sites or in the classfied section of your local rag comes down to distance – all the cars listed are likely to be in your area. Who really wants to drive to the other end of the UK just to test a car they may or may not like? What if you don’t like the colour, the engine, want something newer, older…?! The list is endless.

Luckily, ebay have not only taken notice of this but, with appropriate use of the tools they provide, they’ve made your life a whole lot easier. Using the CAR FINDER you can begin to narrow down the vehicles you may wish to view by make and year, then add in variables to your search such as distance from a specified postcode (you can use any – doesn’t have to be where you live), price, etc..

In terms of lpg vehicles, you can quickly use the Autos categories (in combination with the postcode / distance search) to quickly track down LPG CARS, LPG VANS and PICKUPS + other commercial vehicles and even any LPG PARTS (such as convertors for your existing car) that you are after.

Further to this, if you need the vehicle or part quickly, narrow listings down to Buy-it-Now or classified only. This effectively turns ebay into any other online store – just bigger! You’ll notice by clicking THIS LINK that there are now less cars available to you by specifying you want Buy-it-Now (BIN) listings only – but importantly they’re all available to you NOW. Very useful if say Saturday is the only day you can shop for your new car and you need to SEARCH, VIEW and CONCLUDE a deal all on that one day. Especially as ebay has now integrated Skype into its system – making it easier than ever to establish contact with sellers, when you need to.

So those are the basics – I can’t stress enough the importance of experimenting with the Car Finder because once you get the hang of it, tracking down the perfect motor for you (lpg or otherwise) will be just so much easier.

I’ve been buying and selling on ebay for years – if you’ve any questions please take advantage of my experience and leave a comment on this post, thanks. Cameron

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Buying your lpg car on ebay…? Pt. 1
November 7, 2007, 4:38 pm
Filed under: buying and selling, ebay, investment, lpg, safety, trading, web, www.lpgcarshop.co.uk

This post is the first of a series of three in which I’ll comment o nthe ever increasing trend of buying through ebay. Traditionally the home of the stamp collector, electronics buyer etc.. ebay is now selling more cars than ever before (including more than most specialist car classified sites) and a higher than ever number of lpg cars and other vehicles.

In this post we’ll have a look at security and how to buy easily and safely on ebay and then follow up with posts on what vehicles are available with regard to cars and finally commercial vehicles.

You may already use ebay to make purchases or even sell items yourself. However, chances are that those items are of a comparatively minimal value compared to a new car – something which is commonly cited directly behind homes as one of the biggest purchases people commonly make. For this reson it is importnant to apply different principles and be particularly vigilant when buying cars.

As a general principle you should ALWAYS aim to arrange to view the vehicle and test it, just as you would with a car advertised by any other means. The only difference with ebay is that (in addition to the traditional handshake) you will need to conclude the deal on ebay by winning the car at auction or using Buy-it-Now. If you’re particularly fussy about the car you’re after, or have a very strict budget you may need to view many cars and be prepared to take time to go to the end of each auction. In this instance you may wish to search ebay with your exact requirements and budget in mind and find a car that you can view and conclude on instantly.

To this end, ebay provide the very powerful Car Finder tool which I can’t emphasise enough as being the best way to go about finding your perfect car on ebay. Not only does it let you narrow down make, model, engine, spec and extras (such as lpg conversion) but most importantly it allows you to specify location. Using a similar postcode/distance finder as autotrader and other car-ad systems, this allows you to order search results by distance from your location.

Now, you’ve found the car and won the auction. What about money? Two schools of thought here I would say – either the traditional route of cash-in-hand (which I would personally favour) or stick with ebay protocol and use PayPal or similar. Now, how you do this is u pto you but always, always have a mind to where the car is, who has the keys etc at time of payment. I.e. just because you met a guy at a carpark yesterday and test drove the car does NOT mean he’ll necessarily turn up at the same carpark to hand over the car – once payment is in his account!

Common sense really, but you’d be surprised how often these simple rules are ignored.