What happens to our dead,broken, or defective snowboards? They end up in landfills and have a siginificant carbon footprint. Through a Life Cycle Assessment, Jones Snowboard was able to create a scientific analysis of a snowboard's carbon footprint. Learn what materials have the biggest impact, which processes use the most energy, and more here: SNOWBOARDS CARBON FOOTPRINT
In response to the findings, Jones Snowboards developed Re-Up Tech, the world's first recycling program. This program collects dead boards and utilizes a ground breaking reclamation process to reuse materials in new snowboards. By implementing Re-Up Tech, Jones Snowboards aims to not only save materials but also significantly reduce the carbon footprint of their snowboard production, thereby contributing to a more sustainable snowboarding industry.
How Re-Up Tech Works:
The Re-Up process can reuse about 95% of nearly any snowboard ever manufactured, regardless of brand, model, or year.
Step 1: Collect boards, ship them back to factory
The Re-Up process begins by collecting warranty boards and retired boards from riders and shops around the world. The dead boards are then shipped to our factory using ocean freight. Shipping them back on a slow boat has the smallest carbon footprint possible, and we believe the benefits of recycling still outweigh this unavoidable impact.
When the retired boards arrive at the factory they begin the recycling process along with a small number of defective ‘C’ grade’ Jones boards that got rejected at some stage in the manufacturing process. The ability to recycle factory rejects is another huge benefit of Re-Up Tech.
Step 2: Prepare the boards for recycling
Once back at the factory, the recycling process begins by sanding every board’s topsheet and base to remove any dirt, wax, or solvents. The next step is to remove the steel edges and steel inserts using a mechanical process. The edges and inserts are then set aside to be recycled with other scrap steel.
Without the edges and inserts, the board is now a sandwich of p-tex, epoxy, wood core, stringer material and topsheet. This metal-free sandwich is then flattened in a press to remove any rocker profile or 3D contours.
Step 3: Make a six board sandwich and slice it up
Six flattened boards of any brand or material composition are then stacked, glued and pressed together to create a 24 layer thick sandwich of snowboard materials. The sandwich includes six layers of p-tex, six layers of wood core, six layers of stringers and six layers of topsheet material.
The sandwich is then cut into thin slices that include all 24 layers of recycled material. These thin slices are what gets inserted as performance stringers in the construction of new wood cores.
Step 4: Insert the slices into new wood cores
The thin slices of recycled material are then inserted into new wood cores in the place of a traditional stringer material. Because the layers in the slice are oriented at 90 degrees relative to the word core, base and topsheet, they offer remarkable dampening and stiffening properties. In both factory and on-snow tests, these slices of compressed recycled materials proved to be some of the highest performance stiffening materials we’ve ever tested.
By using only thin slices of each recycled board, the effects of material variability are negated. It doesn’t matter if one board had a faster base + carbon stringers and another board did not. In testing, the performance of any slice, no matter its composition, is virtually identical. The recycled materials are only used in specific areas for dampening and stiffening. The majority of the wood core is made with responsibly harvested virgin wood like a traditional wood core.
How to return your board for recycling
The success of Re-Up Tech relies on securing a consisten supply of used & broken snowboards. To faciliate easy recycling, Jones offers two methods for returning snowboards. Customers can ship boards directly to Jones Snowboards, receiving a $50 cred twards a purhcase of a new Jones board. A preapaid shipping lable is provided at no cost to the customers in the continental US and select Euorpean countries, making the return process hassle free.
To obtain shipping label go here: CUSTOMER BOARD RETURNS!
Customer also have the option to return their snowboard to one of Jones Snowboard's collction partners. The incentives offered for returning the board will be determined by the specific Jones dealer. Jones Snowboards is continuously expanding its network of collection sites in both the United States and Europe, making it easier for customers to participate in the recycling program.
Find a Jones Dealer here: COLLECTION PARTNERS!
THE RESULT OF RE-UP TECH: HOVERCRAFT 2.0:
