Garden shredder with your own hands

A garden shredder is a mechanism designed to process plant waste generated when mowing grass, sanitary or annual pruning of trees, grapes and various shrubs. The resulting small pieces of grass or branches can be used as cattle feed or fertilizer. The use of this unit allows gardeners, owners of summer plots and lovers of beautiful lawns to get rid of organic garbage faster and with less expenditure of labor. The device is relatively easy to install, for this reason it can be assembled by hand without any special financial costs from old parts and scrap materials. This allows you to save on the purchase of a finished factory device.

The main components of the garden shredder

To independently assemble a grass and branch chopper (shredder) at home, it is necessary to first understand the mechanism of the mechanism, as well as the principle of its operation. This will help to properly assemble the equipment and, if necessary, make changes to its design.

The self-made unit, designed to chop mowed grass and cut branches up to several centimeters thick, has the following main constructive nodes:

• engine;
• knives mounted on the working shaft;
• frame (usually metal);
• protective cover;
• a box designed to receive cut vegetation;
• starting system.

The technique itself can be made stationary or mobile form. To create the latter option will require additional wheels, as well as a pen. To make a frame, use metal corners or ready-made frames from workbenches.Boxes for recycled vegetation are made of plastic buckets, tin, bags. The protective cover around the knives must be thick enough and durable so as not to wear out quickly from the effects of milled vegetation.

When processing vegetable garbage from the hole through which it is fed, crushed pieces can fly out. Therefore, the neck is covered with a lid or just a cloth, for example, a bag.

The work of the chopper is that the rotation from the motor shaft is transmitted directly to the blades or through a chain / belt drive. Chopped off vegetation enters the box. In this case, the final product is immediately ready for use.

By principle of operation some homemade shredders are comparable to a meat grinder (they pull in and then grind organic matter), and others with a coffee grinder.

Types of engines for the assembly of homemade

As a drive for homemade use electric and petrol enginestaken from unused technology. Each of these two options has its advantages with disadvantages. Models with an internal combustion engine are more convenient because they do not require a power supply network nearby.But in general, they are more expensive and have a more complex device than their counterparts, equipped with an electric motor. Therefore, it is easier to make electrical equipment, in addition, more compact.

The maximum thickness of the cut branches, which the chopper can grind, depends on the power of the electric motor installed on it and the characteristics of the blades.

1. Models with a motor up to 1.5 kW can grind stick with a diameter up to 20 mm. They are designed to work with a low degree of intensity.
2. If an electric motor is installed from 3 to 4 kW, then such units can chop branches already up to 40 mm thick.
3. More powerful electric motors (over 4 kW) are used to make a shredder for wood with a diameter of 7-15 cm.

The equipment of the latter category is equipped with a drive if it is necessary to constantly perform large volumes of work related to the processing of waste of various thicknesses.

To create a homemade shredder, you can use electric motors from the grinder, washing machine, trimmer. They must be adapted to work from a fixed network of 220 V. In order to grind the material of the greatest possible thickness at home, it is recommended to equip the shredder with an electric motor for 1500 rpm with a capacity of about 3.5 kW. This parameter in internal combustion engines corresponds to 5-6 horsepower.

Types of used cutting nozzles

Homemade, as well as factory units, equipped with cutting nozzles of various types:

• disk (with three edges);

• milling;

• milling-turbine (universal).

The first variety is a flat blade. They grind vegetable garbage while rotating. If you have to recycle branches, then such blades quickly become dull. Milling knives are a cutting shaft in the form of gears from circular saws. They do well with dry waste from branches and grass, and wet milling cutters. Milling-turbine cutting nozzles are able to cope with thick and not dried branches, but to make them yourself is difficult.

At home, often used knives from lawn mowers or made of saws on wood.

It is necessary to consider that directly depends on the established cutting nozzles degree of processing plant waste. At the exit, get pieces of branches from 10 cm long or shavings, dust.

Garden shredder from washing machine

An old Soviet-made washing machine with a metal case is a technique that contains almost all the necessary parts for assembling a garden shredder. You will need only knives with fasteners, as well as a wire on the extension cord.

To make a cutting attachment, you can use an old saw for wood.

From the tools you will need:

• angle grinder;
• pliers;
• spanners;
• screwdriver;
• electric drill;
• hammer;
• Roulette with a marker.

The engine of the washing machine has a small power (different models for different models), indicated in the instructions for household appliances or on the plate of the electric motor. Due to the fact that its value usually does not exceed 500 watts, it will be possible to create grind only straw or grass.

Shredder washing machine is made as follows.

1. Cut the height of the machine body, so that it is convenient to work with the unit.
2. A rectangular hole with a grinder 20 cm wide, and a height of 7 cm, intended for the release of milled plants, is cut from the side down below.
3. Around the slot is made of tin-like casing, which will direct the grass mass into the collection tank, while preventing it from flying away to the sides.
4. Make the legs.
5. Attach the case to the stand.
6. On the motor shaft, drill 2 holes with a diameter of 7 mm each. Then, a threaded sleeve is inserted onto it, as well as with holes at the end of more than 5 cm in length, fixing it with bolts.
7. Under the bottom of the box attached electric motor with studs and nuts.
8. Inside the casing, the knives are fixed on the hub, placing them above the hole for ejecting grass or at the same level with it.
9. The box is attached by welding or bolts to the stand.

The result will be a technique similar to that shown in the photo below.

 

Start Button suitable from a converted washing machine. It is only necessary to take care of connecting an extension cord of sufficient length.

The device and the work of the cutter from the washing machine of the modern type are shown in the video

Homemade grass chopper from the grinder

Grinder grass from the grinder - this is a fairly simple and quick to implement option. To implement the project, you need to stock up on such details and materials:

• steel corners;
• metal container (conventional evaporation);
• homemade or finished knives (for example, from a lawn mower);
• fasteners;
• sheet tin.

From the tools you will need:

• electric drill;
• welding machine and electrodes to it;
• angle grinder to cut corners;
• spanners.

To assemble a shredder with your own hands on the basis of an angle grinder, capable of grinding not only grass, but also branches up to 4 cm thick, it is recommended to use power tools with a capacity of over 3 kW.

Creating a grinding unit is produced in the following sequence:

• grinder cut corners into pieces;
• of them weld frame, resembling a chair;
• weld the shelf from a piece of sheet metal;
• to the frame made (on the stand) attach grinders clamps, having its shaft to the top;
• cut a side of the extrusion hole about 10 to 10 cm;
• a sleeve is attached to the slot, for example, of tin, along which ground vegetable mass will be dispensed from the container;
• make a hole in the center of the bottom;
• install the container on the shaft of the grinder and attach it with bolts or screws to the metal frame;
• put a knife or disk on an angle grinder.

The result will be the construction shown in the photo below.

The sizes of the corners are selected individually, so that it is convenient to handle the mechanism.

It should be remembered that the frame must be stable. From this will depend on the safety of the device.

Under the pipe for dispensing crushed grass with branches, a bucket or other container is inserted during work with the unit so that the processed plants do not fly apart.

The created device can be improved. This will require attachment to the shaft of the grinder about 15 cm long with two knives: at the top end and in the middle. The blades are separated by a grid fixed to the casing wall.

Trimmer cutter

Garden shredder can be done using a gasoline or electric trimmer. This tool will work upside down. To create equipment designed to chop grass and thin twigs, in addition to the mowing machine with cutting nozzles, the following materials are required:

• plastic or metal container with a minimum volume of 50 liters;
• about 1 sq.m. steel mesh with small mesh size;
• about 3 meters of a metal tube (aluminum or steel) in half an inch diameter;
• a piece of board or moisture-resistant chipboard, plywood of such width that a trimmer fits on it;
• clamps, which will be attached to the wooden mowing;
• screws, bolts, nuts, washers;
• wooden bars (5 by 5 cm is enough).

To assemble the trimmer grinding mechanism, you will need to use such tools and devices:

• a screwdriver or a screwdriver with bits;
• electric drill with a set of drills for wood and metal;
• electric jigsaw with files for cutting metal or its manual counterpart;
• a hammer;
• rozhkovy or face keys;
• punch;
• anvil or flat iron plate.

Punch it is necessary that it is convenient to drill holes with an electric drill. This tool is instructed to the point where you want to drill metal. Then they beat it with a hammer. The drill does not slide out of the recess obtained during the drilling of the metal part.

Preparatory activities

Cutting machine from motokosy made in a series of stages. Initially prepared in capacitywhere the grass with branches will be ground:

• make markings on the bottom (along the perimeter) under the four trapezoid holes with rounded corners;
• drill in each drawn segment of the hole section of 1 cm;
• they are inserted into the jigsaw file and cut the trapezium;
• process the sections with a file or sandpaper;
• drill a hole in the center of the bottom of the chopper shaft;
• a circle is cut from the steel mesh with the dimensions of the bottom diameter;
• with the help of small scraps of a board or bars, a prepared net fragment is fixed to the container from the bottom;
• legs are made of metal tubes for capacity, connecting them to the tank with the help of bolts.

Wooden pieces are fixed with screws, twisting them from the inside of the tank into metal jumpers between the carved trapeziums. In this way, the mesh is securely attached to the bottom of the tank.

Legs do the following way:

• bend the tube in a vice or with a pipe bender in the form of the letter "P";
• the ends of future supports flatten with a hammer;
• 2 holes are drilled in them on each side (6.5 or 8.5 mm section);
• adjust the blanks to the bottom of the tank and mark the points of the bolted joints;
• drilled at the hole mark;
• using bolts with washers and nuts, attach to the footboard casing.

After preparing the casing to reduce the size created mechanism, perform the following operations:

• disassemble the trimmer, disconnecting the motor, the bar and the cutting nozzle from each other;
• cut from the rod with a rope fragment of a length of about 20-40 centimeters;
• collect motokosa;
• check the performance of technology.

Chopper assembly

If after assembly the trimmer works well, then a grass chopper is created from it.

1. The motor-mowers are attached to the board with clamps.
2. Fix on the wooden basis a barbell, using for this purpose collars and the handle from a motokosa.
3. Connect the cutting nozzle to the end of the rod, previously inserted into the hole at the bottom of the casing.
4. Start the mechanism and experience it in work.

After the done actions you get an aggregate, the photo of which is shown below.

If the trimmer used for assembling the shredder is equipped with a gasoline engine, then the motor is positioned on the base so that it is convenient to fill in the fuel, start the device and adjust its operation (revolutions).

Cutting nozzles are equipped with knives or fishing line - this depends on the thickness of the crushed vegetable stalks.

What else can a chopper be made of?

There are a lot of different options for creating garden shredders with your own hands: from the simplest, allowing only to grind the grass, to more structurally complex, powerful units designed for wood up to 10 cm thick. Accordingly, for the practical implementation of the plan, different parts, different time and cost expenses will be required.

To collect equipment for processing plant waste, in addition to the considered variants of old or unnecessary tools or equipment, you can use the following devices:

• drill or perforator;
• old working vacuum cleaner;
• unnecessary electric saw;
• engine from the pump;
• petrol or electric tiller;
• any electric motor suitable power.

A drill with a perforator, if you use it to shred the grass, you don’t need to alter it at all. It is enough to do only blade attachment. The created device will work as a blender, grinding the soft stems of plants in a container in small portions.

Nuances of operation of homemade equipment

A self-made shredder is essentially three in one: a shredder for branches, a straw cutter, a mechanism for cutting grass.It helps to significantly facilitate domestic work associated with the disposal of plant waste, as well as the feeding of birds and livestock.

If you have to recycle the grass in small quantities, for example, for chickens, geese, ducks, then quite simple devices that work from the muscular strength of a person, for example, a hand pruner, are sufficient.

For home-made electrical engineering it is recommended to install separate differential automatonto provide reliable protection against electric shock in case of unforeseen circumstances. In any case, making a garden shredder yourself, you must comply with safety regulations. Also, they should be adhered to during the operation of the mechanism. It is recommended that you wear glasses, suitable protective clothing and check the reliability of the fastening of structural elements before working with equipment. When creating a homemade unit, the upcoming amount of work, as well as the nature of the processed vegetation, should be taken into account in order to select the engine with the necessary power and the necessary design of knives. This will allow the device made without any problems to cope with the tasks.