1. Reduce and facilitate operations of disassembly and separation
• Overall architecture
• Prioritize the disassembly of toxic and dangerous components or materials
• Prioritize the disassembly of components or materials with higher economic value
• Prioritize the disassembly of more easily damageable components
• Engage modular structures
• Divide the product into easily separable and manipulatable sub-assemblies
• Minimize overall dimensions of the product
• Minimize hierarchically dependent connection between components
• Minimize different directions in the disassembly route of components and materials
• Increase the linearity of the disassembly route
• Engage a sandwich system of disassembly with central joining elements
• Shape of components and parts
• Avoid difficult to handle components
• Avoid asymmetrical components, unless required
• Design leaning surfaces and grabbing features in compliance with standards
• Arrange leaning surfaces around the product’s center of gravity
• Design for easy centering on the component base
• Shape and accessibility of joints
• Avoid joining systems that require simultaneous interventions for opening
• Minimize the overall number of fasteners
• Minimize the overall number of different fasteners types (that demand different tools)
• Avoid difficult to handle fasteners
• Design accessible and recognizable entrances for dismantling
• Engage reversible joining systems
• Employ two-way snap-fit
• Employ joints that are opened with common tools
• Employ joints that are opened with special tools, when opening could be dangerous
• Design joints made of materials that become reversible only in determined conditions
• Use screws with hexagonal heads
• Prefer removable nuts and clips to self-tapping screws
• Use screws made of materials compatible with joint components, to avoid their separation before recycling
• Use self-tapping screws for polymers to avoid using metallic inserts
2. Engage easily collapsible permanent joining systems
• Avoid rivets on incompatible materials
• Avoid staples on incompatible materials
• Avoid additional materials while welding
• Weld with compatible materials
• Prefer ultrasonic and vibration welding with polymers
• Avoid gluing with adhesives
• Employ easily removable adhesives
3. Co-design special technologies and features for crushing separation
• Design thin areas to enable the taking off of incompatible inserts, by pressurised demolition
• Co-design cutting or breaking paths with appropriate separation technologies for incompatible materials separation
• Equip the product with a device to separate incompatible materials
• Employ joining elements that allow their chemical or physical destruction
• Make the breaking points easily accessible and recognizable
• Provide the products with information for the user about the characteristics of crushing separation
• Use materials that are easily separable after being crushed
• Use additional parts that are easily separable after crushing of materials