Eliminator Instructions
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| Eliminator 300 EM is 36 in tall X 17 in wide X 13 in front to back |
ELIMINATORS ARE NO LONGER IN PRODUCTION. They were manufactured in Australia by PAD Engineering. Manufacturing costs became too much to make them of steel & wood in Australia them ship them to the USA. The cost to ship such heavy bins within the US became way too high. The bin itself is a wonderful bin, but we just haven't found a good way to manufacture them so that they can be sold within an accepable price.
Keys To Good Eliminator Operation
The Eliminator is the most advanced domestic worm driven system on the market today, while being the most advanced it is also the simplest worm waste disposal unit available, no trays to lift or shift or messy disposal of castings.
The Eliminator 300 Vermicomposting System is compact and designed for the home, school, small business, or café. It is a great outdoor bin. It can be brought indoors during extreme temperature conditions but due to the fact that it is so open to the air it is difficult to control flying insects that inhabit the system. Fruit Flies are not a problem outdoors, but in your kitchen they can be rather annoying.
Unlike other worm bins available currently, the total absence of trays or the need to rotate and lift sections of the unit provides almost double the "working space" for your worms, enabling more to be used in a smaller space which makes the unit fast and efficient in the way it treats household food scraps and other organic material.
The Eliminator 300 can process approximately 10 lbs per week at peak capacity. Remember worms can consume about 3 times their weight a week in organic material. Never feed more than 1 ½ inches of food at any one time.
Your unit should have come with the following as a basic kit :
Eliminator unit
User’s Guide
Worm bedding (1 brick of coir bedding & Vermicompost System Starter )
SETUP INSTRUCTIONS
1. Place your Eliminator in a cool spot preferably in a totally shaded environment, if this can not be achieved then at least in afternoon shade (this is more important in summer as composting worms do not like heat). If you want your unit to be mobile place casters or wheels with brakes on your unit before you place any bedding material into it.
If you are transferring a different vermicomposting system to your new Eliminator be careful to place the contents of the bottom layer of your existing bin into the bottom of your Eliminator. Do not invert contents.
2. Before placing anything in your new Eliminator be sure to install the Harvest Bar (the letter "B" should be facing bottom). Place the two ends through the holes in the front, place the ends of the bar into the sleeves of the cross arm, making sure the cross arm is placed on top of the grate with the top of the sleeves facing up (as illustrated in the User's Guide) and within the angle iron on the sides. Place the cotter pins (with openings toward the center of bin) through the holes in the bar and cross arm. Pry open cotter pins to secure the bar to the crossarm. Pull handle back and forth a few times to make sure it is working well, once this has been done place 5-6 sheets of newspaper or 1 layer of cardboard on top of the breaker bar.
3. Place the plastic tray under the worm area on the rails provided.
4. Place the brick of coir into a container with about 2 gallons of water and allow it to soak up and expand for 30 minutes. Be careful to have the moisture of the coir bedding be that of a wrung out sponge. Open your Vermicompost System Starter and mix with coir. Mix several handfuls of rich, dark soil and/or active compost in with the coir. Place mixture in the Eliminator on top of the grate area that you have covered with several layers of newspaper. The purpose of this is to allow the worms to have some where to live so they settle in, it also allows the worms to go directly into the food thus allowing faster waste reduction and castings production.
5. Now you are ready to put your worms into your Eliminator. Place your worms onto the surface of the bedding, gently spread the worms out and allow them to go down into the bedding. You may give them a light sprinkle of water to help them settle in. Any run off will be caught by the tray for use in the garden.
6. Your Eliminator is now ready for recycling your organic waste. Add your organic waste as required, like any other worm bin. It is preferable that you mix your food scraps, fruit and other vegetables with an equal amount of newspaper or cardboard at least every month. This will provide your worms with a good mixture of Nitrogen and Carbon, which assists them to breed and stay healthy .
7. After you have put in your waste, cover it with 3 to 4 inches of moist shredded newspaper to keep it moist, dark and romantic for the worms. Water the bedding all the way to the bottom twice a week to make sure that the vermicastings at the lower part of the bin remain moist and don't harden. If the castings at the bottom harden, it will be difficult to operate the harvest mechanism.
How the Eliminator Works
The Eliminator works on the principle of continuos flow.
Briefly, the biology of composting worms and the nature of the Vermicomposting has established that the majority of the worm mass works in the top 5 – 8 inches of any worm system. That is, the vast majority of worms are working at the top section of any organic waste at any given time, provided that temp and moisture conditions are right.
The Eliminator working bed is approximately 450mm high. Which means that about 2/3rds of the working bed is beneath the working worm mass. As waste is added to a new Eliminator system the worms work their way up to the material. When new waste is added the same think happens.
When the Eliminator system is about 1 inche from the top of the bed, (almost full), then most of the worms are in that top third of the system. There are no trays for the worms to have to migrate through holes so their upward processing pattern is not disturbed or hindered in any way.
By this time a major percentage of the moisture in the system is also in the top 1/3 further encouraging upward migration as the lower layers begin to dry out. At the base of the system, just above the mesh, the Vermicompost is dry at most times.
The system has been trialed extensively and the principle by which the Eliminator is designed has been proven on a commercial scale as well. It consistently delivers a high quality Vermicompost / Vermicast which is free of worms if operated correctly. Like all systems some worms stay at the bottom of the bed but in large the Eliminator has shown a consistently lower volume of worms at the time of harvest.
If worms are present in the harvested compost they can be put back in at the top very easily.
If you are interested in purchasing a Worm Bin System that is currently manufactured, please see our store for details.