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My new Industrial Shredder!

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Jitterbugdude

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Back in February I bought a shredder head via Ebay-Poland. I have now just found the time to put the unit together.

Here is a link to a manual shredder that he sells (.8 mm cut). I don't have a link to the industrial shredder head.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/331550977069?_trksid=p2060353.m1438.l2649&ssPageName=STRK:MEBIDX:IT

Anyway, the first thing I did was make a multi- purpose frame to mount it to. I made it 11 inches tall which would allow me to attach a handle(and not scrape my knuckles when shredding) to it if I ever wanted to manually crank it. The frame was made so that I could mount the head in the upper position for hand shredding or invert and mount it in the lower position for power shredding. I don't ever really envision shredding with it manually though.

DSC01638.jpg


The table I already had. It was my float tray system from this past spring. I simply inverted it.

Here is a shot of the table with a hole cut into it with the shredder mounted.

DSC01639.jpg

I used a series of pulleys and pillow block bearings. The 1/2 hp motor I used runs at 1725 rpm, way too fast for a shredder. Using a pulley rpm calculator I used various size pulleys to obtain a shredder head speed of 191 rpm, at least in theory. When I actually measured the rpm it was 180 rpm- close enough.

To add the proper tension to the belt coming from the shredder I used this little device I welded up. There is a bolt that goes through the square tube, as I screw it in it pushes the pillow blocks away from the shredder. When the belt it tight enough I crank down the nuts.
DSC01642.jpg

Here's a shot of the overall system

DSC01643.jpg

I started to take a video of the shredder in action but my camera stopped and said I had no storage space available. I am bringing some Silver River in to case so tomorrow or Monday I will post a video.

I've only shredded about 2 dozen leaves and so far I am very impressed. This is definitely top notch, extremely well machined piece of equipment. If you shred a lot of tobacco I highly recommend buying a head and building up a system. It will be the last shredder you will ever buy. At 180 rpm the leaf gets instantly shredded. It's pretty amazing to watch.

The guy's name I bought it from is Lucas. He is located in Poland and he speaks perfect English. You can email him direct at "lukimatys@wp.pl" or contact him through ebay (link above). I will invite him to join this forum. I think he has the best power shredder on the market. Very thick steel side plates, replaceable combs and replaceable bearings.

I plan to put this through it's paces in the near future and will post the results.

If anyone is interested I can go in to great detail of the construction. I consider this a prototype. I will build a bigger table maybe this winter and incorporated some improvements.
 

jojjas

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Excellent done Jbd , it will surely do the job real easy and fun
Looking forward to see the video and how it woorks
Mikael
 

Dreamsoul

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I like a lot your setup , for me the only thing against its the size .

So with motor , pulleys , frame , how much do you spend ?
 

Jitterbugdude

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The shredder head was about $300.00. The 4 pulleys, 2 belts and 2 pillow block bearings cost me about $80.00. I already had a motor, a shaft and a bunch of metal. If you were to buy everything it would probably add up to $500.00 for the whole shabang. I look at it this way though: The Powermatic is $300.00 and I know it will not last a lifetime. I have no doubts that this one will.

The size does make it much, much bigger than the compact Powermatic. I plan to make a bigger table to which I will add a pipe tobacco shredder (1.6mm cut) and probably enough space to roll cigars on top.
 

Brown Thumb

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Nice job there. I can't wait to see it in action.
Now you have me wanting to build one. How wide is the cutter head?
 

darren1979

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Holy crap, nice work. Ingenuity at it's best.
But please can you make a push stick, I cringed once or twice when you were feeding the leaves.:)
 

deluxestogie

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...please can you make a push stick, I cringed once or twice when you were feeding the leaves.
Very impressive throughput. I second Darren's motion. (And don't wear a necktie.)

It looks like you'll use this about once a year, to shred everything. Maybe you could use it to cut angel hair pasta the rest of the time.

Bob
 

DGBAMA

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Excellent piece of work.

Are the cutters 1pc CNC, or plates and spacers like the powermatic?
 

Jitterbugdude

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The cutters are 1 piece CNC. The combs are replaceable stainless steel. I bought an extra set.

As for the push stick... consider it done. Although the real issue is the chute. I cut some HVAC conduit for the chute and it is rather flimsy. My next version I will use some nice thick metal that came from an old dehumidifier. I also plan to wire a switch up near the table top.

I should also not that you do not need the series of pulleys and pillow block bearings. You could just use a 2 inch pulley on the motor and a 14-16 inch pulley on the shredder to give you about 200rpm. If you go this route you will have to mount the head about 10 inches beneath the table or on top. Mounting it on top will expose you to the spinning flywheel though. I felt a little uncomfortable with that route so I chose to mount everything underneath the table.

Here is a link to the actual shredder head I bought. It is in Polish. I had found an English version when I ordered mine but can't find it now.

http://www.ebay.pl/itm/PROFESSIONAL...3?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_212&hash=item4d32c9fd07
 

Chicken

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Looks like.a.champ.,perhaps so.meday I may do that to my broke down powermatic,...but for now I'm focusing on a manual handle

I'm close to getting mine fixed..I been riding it around with me.hoping my delivery route will eventually take me by this welding/fabrication shop that does good work....and I can drop it off..and pick it up with a working manual handle...

I'd like to have the shaft tapped and died..so later I can remove the handle and mount a pulley..and mount a motor and belt mecanism
 

BigBonner

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How is the shred compared to the Powermatic ? width wise .

I bet if the whole leaf tobacco was threshed like commercial tobacco , it would just fall in the cutter and cut with out having to get fingers too close to the cutting blades .
Just drop it and chop it .
 

Jitterbugdude

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Update: I had two "jams" while shredding 1 pound of VBL. Both times I took the combs off, thinking they were packed full of tobacco. After the second jam I got to thinking that my motor was too small. I used to have an old table saw and circular saw that did the same thing. I suspected my motor was too small. I contacted Lucas and he says he uses a .7kw motor. So, I went out and bought a 1hp motor and replaced the 1/2 hp motor. I've now shred 2 pounds of VBL and a little over a pound of Silver River with no issues. Bottom line: this system requires a 1hp motor. Oddly enough with the bigger motor it runs smoother.
 

chuditch

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Bigger is always better :). Hence when told my mincer will run with a 3/4 hp but put a 1 hp on it I opted for the 2hp.

Update: I had two "jams" while shredding 1 pound of VBL. Both times I took the combs off, thinking they were packed full of tobacco. After the second jam I got to thinking that my motor was too small. I used to have an old table saw and circular saw that did the same thing. I suspected my motor was too small. I contacted Lucas and he says he uses a .7kw motor. So, I went out and bought a 1hp motor and replaced the 1/2 hp motor. I've now shred 2 pounds of VBL and a little over a pound of Silver River with no issues. Bottom line: this system requires a 1hp motor. Oddly enough with the bigger motor it runs smoother.
 
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