Shredding And Melting Soda Cans With A Paper Shredder - Simple DIY Recycling At Home

Hey everyone! So a lot of people have requested that I do this so I finally did. Some said it would be better and faster and I would get more clean aluminum. Well, I think it was faster to melt overall, but I had more slag than usual and simply shredding all the cans took a while itself. I don’t think it saved me any time by doing it this way. Let me know your thoughts and what else you would like to see in the future. Stay healthy and safe and I’ll see you all next week!

I wouldn't have believed a paper shredder would be able to do aluminum cans so easily. Theres always something to learn watching your videos

Shredding them increases the surface area available to oxidize the aluminum. Getting the metal plunged down into the molten metal quicker reduces losses from oxidation. It may be beneficial to crush the cans first, but that comes with issues of getting them to fit in the opening of the crucible and can trap any moisture that may be left in the can. Cheers!

Do a comparison between shredding vs crushed. I’d be interested in space taken before melting, and of course slag produced for a set number of cans. I have noticed that the beer cans provide the most Al per can though.

Cool idea. I never thought of using a shredder. Nice compact shreddings.

It's interesting to see how little aluminum there was after shredding the cans. And to think, it really didn't help with anything except to save space. Great video.

You should have done a side by side - fifty cans shredded, fifty cans whole.
Weigh the tanks before and after to determine how much fuel used and then weigh the aluminum at the end.
My thought is that the shredded aluminum is likely using less fuel but I'm betting you're correct about more slag due to the larger surface area allowing for more oxidation.
You're likely saving time and effort too since I'm sure it's easier to dump 20 shredded cans in at a time than to feed them in one by one.
As for time it takes to shred, for me it would actually be less since the wife isn't strong enough to crush a can flat by can crush one enough to feed it into the shredder and I would simply feed the cans through as they're being used, thus saving myself the space taken up by trash cans and bags full of crushed cans.

MAN! Changed my life. I welded up an aluminum frame and build a press using parts from an old hydraulic jack just to compress cans down enough to fit in my electric foundry. I had an unused 16 page shredder and did the modification (cut the lid open) and it just rips through cans. I walked passed that thing every day, even the days I was pressing hundreds of cans and never thought about using it to shred cans. Thank you!

I wanna see the BigstackD remix of this technique. With as much as that man can go through, I think he'd make some sweet work as well.

I just want to say that it was very satisfying to watch the cans go through the shredder. I could watch that for hours.

I found that a steel food can makes a good single use aluminum crucible and I do think this would make it easier to pack cans into that. I'm also just using charcoal and forced air to melt so I don't have as easy of a time adding things to the melt as i would with a nice gas foundry

The only thing I can think of that is different when shredding the cans is that more surface area is exposed to oxygen to create oxides and cover it with other impurities. It should only effect the dross yield only minutely so there must be an additional mechanism at work here to produce the greater amount of slag.

Might be useful for better storage before melting?
Like, how much space did it take shredded vs non shredded? stock up on aluminum and then do a big pour.

That was seriously genius using a paper shredder like that!

Love to see things get melted 😍. Love your videos 👍.

You wouldn't think increasing the surface area of the cans as you shredded them would result in more slag. I guess the increased surface area means more oxidisation = more slag. To get a decent yield you'd have to use cans in their hundreds.

Dude, that is such a great idea using the shredder!! Kudos

Very interesting that you said there was more slag having shredded the cans. I've found crushing the cans and throwing them in minimise the slag. Will give it a try and compare.

Pretty interesting that you end up with more slag... any idea why? Really pretty cool how well your shredder works on those cans but yeah I can see how it ends up being a bit more of a pain then just crushing them...

What great idea, melting cans is a pain, love it

Awesome! I just ordered two of your pirate coin molds and they should be arriving today. After watching this video I'm going to stick to just crushing the cans and melting them! Thanks for all your content and thanks for the inspiration!

That’s a freaking great idea to shred lol I kept looking for industrial.

So this is all I had to do to have a shredder that shreds more than just paper? You are a GD genius!

Great video .I agree with what u said about not shredding the cans .just melt them whole 👍

Would like to see same amount of un shredded cans Vs shredded can and see which has more slag
Ether way I love the shredder just because of the space savings Vs whole or flattened cans

ADAM always nice to see a good pop can melt that shredder worked awesome i really enjoy that part of it do more stuff you can shred 👍😎🇨🇦👍😎🇨🇦👍😎🇨🇦

I've literally been waiting all day for this video love it so cool

I really just need to see more cans shredded

Have you ever tried adding white sand to molten aluminum to create a thermite reaction and get silicon aluminum alloy?

Finally found the mold I was looking for it was on your website out of my current budget for it but I will be buying a few within 2 months

Hi there - I just did a melt and the toxin/smell was terrible - how did you manage that?

Could you try an experiment next time that you are melting cans? Before you skim the dross, cut way back on the oxygen going into the venturi for a few minutes to compare how much you get with a reduction flame. I am thinking that you might be able to convert some of the aluminum oxide to metallic aluminum.

So, I'm curious. Do you think the additional slag from shredding them gave you a more pure aluminum ingot?

A great try. And interesting info. Thank you for sharing

Electric furnaces are far better for aluminum, takes a bit to warm up, but you get more yield out of it. Also can cheaply remelt the slag because there still is good metal in the first batch of slag.

What is the size of your two smaller molds? They appear to make 1/2 pound aluminum ingots, which is the size I'm looking for.

You answered my question with this video, nicely done bro.

Very neat ! Keep it up mate

Honestly, shredding the cans with a paper shredder is a great idea :) Thanks for trying it anyway

All I want to say is that slag is not always just slag tho It does take much greater volumes there are still recoverable amounts of any metal in slag I'd love to see a slag melt video I keep and remelt all slag untill it literally turns to dust, it's two things for me, for one I enjoy melting, for recovery of the metals and two, . Yeah, I see dollar signs lol I dont keep any thing I sell it all either for scrap or I stockpile it to sell later, I love the channel buddy definitely keep up the awesome content, you and bigstacked are have the best melting vids on youtube later for now

Your yield is really going to go up if you used a flux like borax. It'll rip a lot of that aluminum out of the slag.
Thing I found with crushing cans is that they're just so damned unwieldy to get in the furnace as it's going. I've considered a funnel of some kind so I could just start shredding cans and pouring it in to the furnace, rather than fiddling around with it a can at a time. Maybe with an augur of some kind...hmm...

Would like to see someone try to do a small old time 2 man tree saw. I am having so much trouble filling in all the cutting teeth with rings at the end to slip some dowell wood in. Always blocks up before filling in everything.

The one advantage to the shredder would be to shred the cans as they become available to save on storage space.

Love that paper shredder idea

So my question is, how much fuel did it take for the process, and can you sell the ingots for more than just the cans and where?

Every day I look at my shredder in disappointment. I showed this video to the shredder and tried to encourage it to perform at higher level. I guess I'll just have to get a puppy if I want things shredded.

Great vid. Would it be a waste of time to re-melt the slag? Also what to do with the slag. Thx for the vid

Now you can make something epic with that aluminum! 😜

Hey MR. Adrock I think we might have had this conversation before, But I think you're going to need some bigger shelves soon mate 😁. keep up the good work and Stay safe See you on the next episode. 👍 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟

I can see how at a minimum it would be beneficial from a storage perspective. Cans certainly take.up a lot of room

Thanks for all the info and process for melting you left that one important component... what is the make and model of the paper shredder?

After shredding you should dangle in a magnet, cause many cans are mixed metals.

Such great ideas, about shredding cans

Would love to see you do a full sized skull out of copper.

Where do you get the your molds from? or do you make them?

great stuff nice to see other methods

😅 that paper shredder needs a medal

Aluminum slag (dross) is made of aluminum oxide due to combination with the air. It’s a by product of the act of smelting. I’m wondering if shreds introduces more air, thus more slag.
Maybe run a test with highly compacted aluminum in a crucible vs. shred in a crucible to see which forms more slag.

I can’t think of any reason you would end up with more slag logistical. It doesn’t make sense to me. Did you try and go back and re-melt the slag to see if you got any more pure aluminum out of it? That’s what I would’ve tried. Other than that great video. Cheers.

It looks like the slag had less aluminum in it than when the cans aren't shredded. Maybe, there'd be even less slag if you shoved the added metal below the surface to keep it from oxidizing before it melts.

I wonder if it’s more worth it to melt down and collect the aluminum or to just recycle it for the bottle fee

Try shredding, and then pressing it into a round shape that fits the crucible using an old juice can as a form and a bottle jack maybe.
The shredder needs a feed chute...

I like the idea of taking up less space while collecting enough cans but maybe more Slag is a deal breaker.

Awesome!!👍😁

You have to test the hypothesis. You did the experiment and got the result. Cool! Good to hear the voice behind the art too.

That is what I thought that shredding the cans you had more slag. But it did make some nice ingots ;-)

Great video!

Cool melt! Didn'tt know you can run a can threw a shredder. I thought it jam it up.

Well you should've turn shredded cans into a huge clean ingot and clean it off, and remelt the ingots you used with shredded cans to melt

Damn, 2.8k views in 4 hours. That’s so cool!

Always astounded by the amount kf slag/dross from cans. Thx bruv slainté

What are the kilns and molten aluminum containers made of? Is it stone or iron, I'm from Indonesia 🙏

Where did you [and BigStakD] get those custom stainless/chrome furnace covers? Did D.F. send them to you?
Also- I'm hoping that my fam follows my xmas list: cause I have a few molds from your store that I want.... (star wars, super heroes)..

Thank, great vid.
I messed around with shredding & got to the same conclusion. 😀
Watching how the cans "poof" has entertainment value.
Mmm, 🤔

Awesome video. How did you cut the plastic? That is some hard awkward plastic to cut. Trying to cut mine open bigger like yours. Thanks.

I wonder if u can use that machine to shredd copper wire,(to make it smaller ånd easier to stack in boxes if you are not melting it.),or if it only tangels upp ånd makes a mess. Would be Interesting to se if it shredds the wire with isolation/plastic on it ås å different way to strip the cabels

I saw a video last week where someone shredded the cans tens times before melting them I thought this was just a waste of time and money. Thank you for the video and thumbs up.

Where did you get your custom forge from? An amazing as usual.

The slag is my favorite. Especially on aluminum its like a 2,000 degree slimy substance.😂

I wonder if I can still sell the cans if they are shredded? That would save so much space.

small peaces have way more surface area than whole can has... heat makes the aluminium oxidize quit fast, so even if the aluminium oxide formed is 4nm, all adds up and you get more slag than if you use whole cans... also impurities in the aluminium or some alloys of aluminium make thicker oxide layer. that's my logic tho, might not be true...

Couldn't help but notice the tabs were gone. The kids used to collect them for school. Do you have special plans for them? Supposedly pure T 1 so they are much more valuable than a contaminated can

leave it to Adrock to shred and melt, i love it man i kinda want one now! =)

Most cans are only 70% alum. so a lot of slag seems normal (so I've been told).

seventy five cans is about two and a half pounds (the twelve oz anyway) if you had a way to cut them in half after crushing them to relieve the steam pressure it might be the best option a 4x4 with some gravity will get them about as thin as cheaply possible unless you got some good heavy cast iron and some very understanding neighbors

would compressing the cans further produce less slag, and more product?

Hello quick question aluminium cans value is £50 a ton if you melt it down will it become clean aluminum witch the value is about £650 pounds is that right thanks

03:28 I heard they make warships from Aluminum. Wonder how that's going to work out in the next war.

The return rate is shocking. A can is cca 15 gramms and your average return was somewhere between 6-7 gramms.

You should make the crucifix knife from Johnny Mnemonic that Dolph Lundgren used.

i dont think the fact of shredding them or not affect the amount of slag. The cans are made from the same amount of materials and shrediing dont add or extract anything, its just a smaller form of the same stuff. What will affect it but tend to be forgotten it the left over liquids in the cans. those left overs create slag as well and since then are most likely stuck to the inner layer, shredding it dont take em off either. at least from whay i 'can' see ;)

Seems like shredding em is messier than just adding them solid

I apparently bought the wrong paper shredder. Mine barely shreds my mail!

I do the same with small wire to separate the copper

Here is a idea shred make a mold to place in crucible but with steel. Put shred in until full the compact till mold is full rinse and repeat.

My shredder bogs down if I put more than two sheets of paper in it at a time. 😞

Wondering if melting more cans faster would save on propane usage, just added more labor to shred them first??

Me watching you pick up the pain flakes by hand: D8>

I collected a few pounds of plain unpainted aluminum pull tabs. I don't think there would be any slag, or very little from just plain pull tabs.

The slug is aluminium oxide or colors and other impurities added in the cans?