Stephen wrote:

Hello,

I think someone has posted a link here in the past for a supplier of
cogs for paper shredders. Can anyone tell me the link please?

I have a Fellowes paper shredder. It claims to shred eight pages at a
time but is only managing two. I looked inside and the cogs are
plastic and one has a split in it. I am hoping changing the cog might
fix the problem.

If not, I will replace the shredder. I must have had it six or seven
years and although it is only used for domestic use, it is beginning
to show its age: some bits of plastic have started falling off but
nothing that exposes the blades and endangers the user.

Has anyone ordered any of the cheap shredders (£20ish) from CPC? I
wondered how good they were as a replacement?

One grumble is that we ought to shred junk mail as we receive it but
we tend to let it accumulate and then shred the night before the bin
men are due. Although we are not shredding mountains of paper, the
overheat cutout always seems to stop us halfway through. I am
surprised how quickly this operates. Are all shredders so quick to do
this?

Thanks,
Stephen.

I have recently got a broken Fellowes shredder off Freecycle. There
was a 7-tooth plastic cogwheel that had shattered, but it was moulded
to an undamaged larger cogwheel. Firstly, I tried inserting sections
of steel knitting needle into the larger wheel at the positions where
the tips of the broken teeth were. This worked until I inserted a wad
of paper - the rods all bent and damaged one of the cogs of the final
wheel. (The 'steel' is in fact a hard aluminium alloy).

I hen found instructions on the web that said a maximum of 6 sheets.

I have now put steel screws instead of the knitting needles, and will
not shred more than 2 sheets at a time, because the speed is
noticeably slower for 2 sheets than for 1!

Cheap shredders are 'strip-cut' rather than 'cross-cut', so a
dedicated criminal could piece the strips together in far less time
than it would take to assemble the shreds.

Dave W