Using the Scotspin
1. When you first start a new composter from scratch it is always advisable to add a good dollop from another compost heap in order to get a starter culture of bacteria and other micro organisms. Don’t worry if this is not possible.
2. The aim is to ¾ fill the composter over a period of time (remembering to leave enough space for the materials to tumble). Starting from scratch add a bucket of dry woodchip/sawdust* (a mix of both is fine) and a bucket of fresh ‘greens’, fruit and vegetable peelings. Also add a bucket of composting material from an active heap if at all possible to kick start the microbial populations, a bucket of finished compost is also good. Keep adding and tumbling on a daily basis during the week, don’t worry about the weekends, it’ll be fine. Each day the volume should reduce leaving more space. 3. Normal ratios of ingredients:
i) for cooked food, plate scrapings and left over unserved food follow the rule of thirds: One bucket fresh raw peelings etc to one bucket of cooked food and one bucket of dry woodchip/sawdust (you may need to add extra woodchip/sawdust if the cooked food is particularly dense, wet and heavy).
ii) for mostly raw fruit and vegetable peelings etc follow a 50 /50 ratio roughly equal volumes of fresh materials with woodchip/sawdust
4. During the start up phase – for the first few weeks or month, it’s best to make sure that the air supply, in the form of woodchip/sawdust is higher than is needed rather than less. If you start a system with not enough structure it can easily go airless and start to smell and then it’s difficult to get it back on track.
5. When you first start composting it is also advisable to limit the materials as far as possible to fresh peelings rather than tackling the cooked fraction, introduce this element gradually as and when the compost is steaming away nicely.
6. Cardboard is also a good substance to add in small amounts at the beginning of the composting process as it helps balance the pH, cardboard dust is even better if you can get it or cardboard shredded for bedding. Be careful of adding too much that it balls up and dries the composting material out too much.
NB these are just guidelines and you can augment food waste composters with garden clippings just balance the ‘browns’ and ‘greens’ as much as possible.
The Scotspin is a batch system tumbler. When your tumbler is about ¾ full you don’t want to add any more food or it will not tumble and mix effectively. Without fresh materials being added, after a few days the temperature will start to drop and the cooling phase will be entered. So, you will need to empty it and place the contents into your maturation bin before you can add more fresh material. The final stages of cooling down and maturation takes much longer and is best carried out in this maturation bin.
The Scotspin has one chamber, this means that the most recent materials added will have hardly started to break down when the whole chamber needs emptying, unless you have two Scotspins or an additional system of some sort. It doesn’t matter that not all the materials are composted, the uncomposted materials are well mixed in and can be layered into a secure maturation bin preferably set up on a hard standing base of paving slabs or similar (e.g.Scotty’s Hot Box) which becomes in effect a large wormery.
The Scotspin arrives fully assembled and up to two Scotty's Hot boxes can be delivered on the same pallet saving on delivery costs
Scotspins cots £620 + VAT and delivery - contact recycling@proper-job.org 01647 432985
size of base 47 cm x 119 cm
