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==Paper Shredder== ===Shredder scissors===
- Small, light, cheap,
- Convenient for minimal amounts of shredding
- Can cross cut or strip cut
===Manual shredder=== Ok for shredding a percentage of domestic mail
===Electric shredder===
- The most popular type of shredder
- Very wide range of units & prices
Properties
- Strip or crosscut - crosscut is more secure
- Size of strips or pieces
- Number of sheets taken in one go
- Speed of shredding
- How it handles staples (jams, stops, passes them whole or shreds them)
- Some also chop CDs and credit cards
- How it handles jams - some automatically reverse feed to clear a jam.
Shredded paper is used for animal bedding, and can often be given away on freecycle etc.
===Alternatives===
- burn
- microwave destruction of CDs
==Garden shredder== Designed to shred tree prunings & sometimes weeds. Shredding turns the prunings into mulch.
Properties
- Size limit - maximum wood size tends to be small with domestic units, often around an inch. The biggest units can swallow whole trees.
- [[Noise]] - most garden shredders are extremely noisy, making ear defenders essential, and annoying neighbours
- Mechanism type - some behave better than others
- Blade replacement - usually blades are replaceable & cheap. Generally they can be resharpened with an [[angle grinder]] several times before replacement.
===Other uses=== Garden shredders can also be used to shred used [[carpet]] to make fibres for concrete crackproofing. Clearly this is a use not recommended by manufacturers, and may invalidate guarantees.
- Precut the [[carpet]] into diagonal strips. They need to be diagonal to limit max thread length, otherwise the shredder mechanism may be tied up & jammed.
- Doing this by hand is hard going, an [[Scissors|electric cutter]] makes it easy.
- Feed the strips in one at once, it can be hard going for the machine.
- Expect to need to open a jammed mechanism occasionally and cut threads out.
The resulting mixed fibres can be added to concrete to increase its tensile strength and counter cracking. Around 1% fibre is used for this. Its also possible to use them with [[bitumen]] for roof repairs, at a much higher percentage. Only synthetic fibres are recommended, wool pile or canvas backing doesn't last so well. Finally its possible to make a low grade fibre cement by mixing a high percentage of fibre with [[cement]] & [[sand]].
==See also==
- [[Special:Allpages|Wiki Article Index]]
- [[Special:Categories|Wiki Subject Categories]]
[[Category:Appliances]] [[Category:Carpet]] [[Category:Garbage]] [[Category:Garden]] [[Category:Tools]] [[Category:Wood]]