Shredder oil

[Jonno]

What's so special about shredder oil that Staples want £20 a pint for it ?

Does it work any better than some 3 in ?

[GB]

I'd love to know.

I have just acquired a chain saw attachment for my hedge trimmer. It apparently requires chain saw oil. I have olive oil. I have 2 stroke oil. I probably can lay my hands on some 20-50 engine oil. Do I need to also buy chain saw oil?

[Tim Watts]

It is a synthetic oil designed not to leave a residue, which 3:1 will, resulting it accumulation of paper dust until it starts jamming.

I agree it's expensive at £8 a bottle (300 odd ml) but that bottle will last forever.

[Roger Mills]

Yes. It apparently is formulated to stay on the chain better, and not get thrown off when the chain goes round the gears with high angular velocity.

But the likes of Screwfix sell some quite respectable stuff which is a lot cheaper than that branded by the chainsaw manufacturers.

[Adam Funk]

I have a 350 ml bottle that looks about 40% full. It's probably 10 years old & I bought it from RS (really). It smells like vegetable oil, though.

[Tim Lamb]

I don't know the detail but apart from high stick chain saw oils are environmentally friendly which probably pushes up the cost.

>

[Harry Bloomfield]

Chain saw oil, at least IS different. It is very clingy to surfaces, rather like runny toffee, it pour and leave long strings of oil.

[John Rumm]

You do. Mainly because its sticky and "anti fling", but also because its normally biodegradable - so better as you will be throwing it all over your garden. I find a 4L can from Doe & Son will last me several years and cost something like £12 IIRC.

[The Natural Philosopher]

chain saw oils is 'biodegradeable'

but its not expensive and you get through a lot of it.

[dennis]

Its probably safer, you wouldn't use any of those in an air powered tool would you? Chainsaws also chuck the stuff about and you breath it in.

[newshound]

You can see the effect of the "sticky" additive if you spray Toolstation's "Chain Spray" on a hedge trimmer. Next time you use it, the blades won't move until you apply some penetrating oil / WD40 or whatever.

I think "proper" chain saw oil is worth using but as others said, there are cheaper sources than Stihl from Countrywide.

[Andrew Gabriel]

I spray silicone lubricant onto a sheet of paper and feed it through the shredder. It is flammable, and I have wondered if any arcing from the motor brushes might be able to ignite the vapour, but it hasn't done so yet. YMMV...

[Bob Eager]

I used shredder oil and eventually had to take the printer apart and clean out all the gunge anway. But it was quite a long time...

FSVO 'forever'. The bottle of Fellowes oil suffered from deteriorating plastic and eventually leaked into a pool of oil in the drawer. I keep it in a plastic bag now!

[Huge]

I've been using WD40 for this. My shredder (a high security cross-cut one that generates chads about 2mm by 1mm) is ~18 months old & is still going fine.

(The top snapped off the bottle of oil provided & it went everywhere, so I threw it away in a rage.)

[tabbypurr]

Any oil that's not very thin will accumulate paper debris and pull it into the gears. I've had to clean them out.

Its the gears that benefit from grease rather than the cutters.

NT

[PeterC]

I bought the cross-cut shredder last time Lidl had it in. There's no mention of oil anywhere, but judging from the state of the paper out the blades aren't quite pressed together - it's not a clean, scissor-like cut but a bit frayed.

[newshound]

I use a can of something called maintenance spray (which I think came from a pound shop) in just the same way. I suspect that it is just a thin oil with propellant. Certainly doesn't seem to cause clogging. I find that mine slows up sometimes because of compacted stuff around the spindle at the end of the cutting rack. I *think* this happens if you don't feed paper square so that it runs into the sides and folds over, seems to need doing much less often now that I am more careful.