repairing a paper shredder?

[The Night Tripper]

Hi All I've been offered an old paper shredder cheap. It's a Rexel P-190 strip- cut shredder FWIW. It's been removed from mainline service in an office as 'it doesn't work very well' - I think it doesn't cleanly separate the strips all the time etc.

A somewhat higher powered shredder like this would come in handy at home, if only for shredding prior to paper going on the composter. We already have a small cross-cut shredder but it's a bit short on grunt (as they all seem to be). But would there be any mileage in trying to fix/improve this fault? I'm guessing it may just be old age, and that the cutters are knackered ... but I'd be interested to learn of uk.d-i-y type repairs/improvements I might be able to consider...

Thanks j^n

[John]

Probably never been oiled in accordance with the instructions. I used to do the one in our office every week. When I retired no-one did it and I believe it failed after about 2 months.

[Bob Eager]

I'd try oiling it. There is proper shredder oil but I'd be interested to know how important that is!

I oil mine regularly (well, whenever I think it's not working as well).

I also find that the oily paper powder gums up the actuator paddle, and once a year or so I take it apart and clean that out.