Waste paper rebaler

A method of rebating lower density bales of waste paper to form higher density bales, the method comprising the steps of:

• using a fork lift truck to retrieve two strapped lower density bales from a remote location and delivering them to a loading platform of a rebaler;
• pushing with forks of the fork lift truck one of the lower density bales through a rectangular feed port and into a breach of a rebaler housing;
• pushing with the forks of the fork lift truck the other lower density bale through the rectangular feed port and into the breach of the rebaler housing so that the bales are in side-by-side relationship with respect to one another, the rebaler housing being formed of vertical side walls and a vertical end wall joined by horizontal top and bottom walls and defining an interior space having a downstream end proximate the vertical end wall, an upstream end opposite the downstream end, and a width defined by a distance between the vertical side walls, with the breach being defined at the upstream end of the interior space, the rectangular feed port being formed in one of the vertical side walls adjacent to and in communication with the breach, and with the long axes of the bales extending across the width of the interior space;
• progressively moving a compression ram from the upstream end toward the downstream end to first push the two strapped lower density bales from the breach and into a compression chamber defined at the downstream end of the interior space, and then to compress the two lower density bales together against the vertical end wall to form a higher density bale;
• binding the higher density bale to maintain the bale in its compressed configuration;
• ejecting the higher density bale through a rectangular ejection port formed into one of the vertical sidewalls of the housing and onto a retrieval platform located beneath and outboard of the ejection port;
• and
• retrieving with the fork lift truck the higher density bale from the retrieval platform.