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During the season, a lot of garbage appears on the summer cottage: branches of trees and shrubs, vegetable tops, flower stems, herbs. They can be put on mulch or compost, but for this you need to grind. Stores offer shredders of different capacities, but it is quite possible to make a garden shredder with your own hands from a grinder. Instead of an expensive purchase, craftsmen-summer residents themselves assemble tools from various parts of old mechanisms, which are available in abundance in every household.
The only design flaw may be insufficient security, since a home-made chopper will not be provided with a locking system for accidental activation and a special casing that covers the knives.
How the tool works
All shredders (or shredders) are designed for cutting branches, grass, leaves, vegetables, paper. To operate such a unit, you need a motor, knives, a base on which it all rests, some kind of area, a hole for feeding grass and branches, a container or just a hole where already crushed raw materials for compost fall.
Shredders run on electric or gasoline engines. The device on a gasoline, more powerful engine, can process even branches 5 cm thick, work longer, more, it can be moved around the site (it can be heavy), it does not depend on a power outlet. But it needs to be looked after, it needs to be refueled, besides, it makes noise and pollutes the air.
An electric engine is considered environmentally friendly, it does not spoil the air, it makes less noise, it is much lighter than a gasoline one, but somewhat less powerful. An electric shredder will not cut a branch thicker than 4 cm, it is doomed to work stationary near an outlet and suffer from power surges. But summer residents usually prefer it. Its power is quite enough to work on a small area, if it is not a huge garden of several hectares.
Actually the cutting part is of varying complexity. The simplest option is a knife with three blades, a more complicated one is a chopper with a whole system of different knives, or maybe powerful equipment in which a mechanism with screws or even a turbine is installed. Each owner himself can decide how powerful a tool he needs to cut branches, grass and leaves on the site.
Compared with other household appliances, some shredders act like a meat grinder – they draw in and grind herbs and branches, throw the resulting product into a bowl or just on the floor, while others cut into containers like coffee grinders.
What materials will be needed
All broken household appliances and tools that are a pity to throw away usually accumulate in the country. Therefore, an old washing machine or vacuum cleaner may be at hand, they may well come in handy.
To create a chopper, three main components are needed: a motor, a cutting system and a funnel for feeding branches and grass.
An old Typhoon vacuum cleaner with a wide opening on top can be used as a base, the motor can be taken from an old washing machine, new knives can be bought, and the box can be made from a profile. Such devices have already been made and described, the description and drawings are easy to find on the Internet.
After Vladimir Belyaev made his chopper and posted a video of his work on the Internet, many tried to modernize the idea and assemble something similar based on the grinder.
For such a design, you will need a Makita grinder, an old vacuum cleaner, not very powerful, but working. Knives can be made from a saw, for example, or you can take it from a lawn mower, a regular three-bladed knife will do. You will also need a metal table with a vertically welded sheet of metal, a funnel into which branches and grass will be fed for grinding, bolts to secure the grinder, and a stable stand.
Video “Chopper Vladimir Belyaev”
See how the inventor V. Belyaev embodied his idea to make a garden waste grinder based on a grinder.
What is good homemade option
A home-made shredder differs from a factory-made shredder in its versatility of design; usually, not only branches and grass are crushed in it, but also spoiled fruits, household garbage. If its design clearly loses to the factory one, then the functionality is the opposite. Knowing the volume, size and hardness of the waste, the owner will make the most convenient tool for himself.
The fantasy, ingenuity and perseverance of the summer resident help to create exactly the device that is suitable for his garden, the known volume of garbage and the intensity of work. If you want to save on all the components of the chopper, you can buy very good knives or make them from circular saws, for example.
Step by step guide
Garden shredder drawing
It is advisable to start the creation of any design with a drawing. Even if it is not accurate and detailed, you need to determine the size of the stand, table, funnel, determine the place for fixing the grinder and installing the knife. All this must first be depicted on paper, carefully thought out, and then collected. A schematic image will help to prepare in advance all the necessary details.
It is good to use a 3,2 kW Makita grinder as a motor. A small metal table with a horizontally welded receiving funnel is mounted on a wooden base. The funnel is installed on a vertical metal sheet that will hold the knife and grinder on itself, it must be thick according to its purpose. A small pipe, through which air is supplied from an old vacuum cleaner so that the already crushed mass does not clog the knives, is also attached to this sheet. The grinder must be firmly attached to this vertical side of the table with bolts (you will need three bolts).
We will use three-blade knives from a lawn mower, if their seat does not quite fit with the grinder, you just need to sharpen it so that the knives sit down.
The stand can be any stationary. You can separately make a wooden one or adapt an old one from something. It is necessary to arrange so that the vacuum cleaner and the angle grinder turn on at the same time, their plugs can be included in the extension cord, and with the usual button turn on its connection to the network. It will be convenient to put the extension cord on the ground and turn it on with your foot – your hands are still busy.
You also need to attach a casing that will prevent chopped branches and grass from flying in the opposite direction.
Here is a very simple version of a garden shredder you can make at your dacha.
Video “An example of a homemade garden shredder”
This video will let you take a peek inside one of the homemade garden waste shredders.
