Homemade Can Crusher

[James-W]

We used to have a hand operated can crusher mounted on a wall in our old garage. It worked OK, there wasn't anything wrong with it, but nobody liked to use it because it took a little effort to operate and when you have a whole bunch of cans to crush up, your arm got a bit tired.

So, when we built the new garage I figured that since we had a new garage we should have a new can crusher to go along with it. I had been kicking around an idea for a can crusher in my head for a few years and this seemed to be an appropriate time to get started on building it.

I have included a link to a video of the can crusher. The video is 24.4 mb so it may take a while for it to load if you don't have a high speed Internet connection. The young woman in the video is our oldest daughter Kelly, she is our "video star" and she has done several videos for us. I took the video, so if it isn't real good, that would be my fault.

http://www.windemuth.org/video-files/Can-Crusher.wmv

 

[IHI]

LMAO!!! Awesome idea and execution

 

[kbs2244]

For those of you with an hour or two or seven, go to y=tube and search "can crusher."
It is amazing the different ways you can do it.
BTW, Nice machine.

 

[James-W]

Thanks guys, I enjoy making stuff like this, it gives me a sense of accomplishment when I get an idea and then turn that idea into something that actually works.

I like the idea of feeding the cans in vertically, it just seems simpler that way, so I needed to figure out a way to tip the cans over before they were crushed. If you guys want me to I can take some close up pictures of the can crusher to give you a better idea of how it works.

 

[Marshall2u]

Love this kinda stuff! Good job!

 

[skulldrinker]

you need a revolving turret on top to auto load a bushel of can at once. good job!

 

[Cryptic1911]

hahah, that's so cool!

 

[James-W]

Here are a few close-up pictures of the can crusher. Hopefully this will give you a better idea as to what is happening as the cans get crushed.

The electric motor is 1/3 hp and it came from a household auction in a box with a bunch of other stuff. I can't remember for sure, but I think the whole box of stuff was only $2 so it was well worth it. The motor pulley was already on the motor, I had to buy the larger pulley on the gearbox.

The little gearbox is from some sort of magazine packaging machine that my brother had picked up for free and when he discovered it didn't work at all, he scrapped it. I think the gearbox has a 10 to 1 ratio and the motor pulley is 1 inch while the gearbox pulley is 5 inches. The motor speed is 1725 rpm's which is plenty fast.

The belt I had laying around the garage for a very long time, not sure what it is from anymore. I have a tendency to keep stuff around even when I have no idea what I am going to do with it, this happened to be one of those things. My wife says I am a pack-rat, but I prefer to think of myself as some who is always "thinking ahead".

On top of the steel plunger that crushes the cans is a piece of flat aluminum. This piece serves two purposes, it pushes over the can so it is laying down before it gets crushed, and it also keeps the rest of the cans from falling down while it crushes the can that has already fallen down.
There is a roll pin sticking up a little in the bottom of the channel iron, this keeps the can from possibly sliding when it is hit from the top by the flat piece of aluminum. The plunger that crushes the can has a slot cut in the bottom to provide a place for the roll pin to pass thru the plunger without getting sheared off. You may have noticed there is a hole in the middle of the plunger, the hole serves no useful purpose in-so-far as the can crusher is concerned, it just happened to be in the chunk of steel I used to make the plunger

The metal was all used metal picked up from a local supplier who sells new and used metal. The piece of aluminum that sits on top of the plunger was given to me by a buddy of mine who works at a shop where they work on large trucks. They throw smaller pieces of metal away and this piece happened to be in their junk barrel so he salvaged it for me.

That's pretty much all there is to it, it isn't really all that complicated, but it works quite well. A buddy of mine says I should patent it, but there is no way I could possibly get it approved by OSHA. It would need all sorts of guards around it and I am not sure it would pass even then.

 

[jweller]

Pretty cool.

As a complete change of direction, I noticed the Craftsman bandsaw in the background. I've got that same saw, but I haven't had much luck getting treads to stay on the wheels. I'm curious if you've got treads on your wheels or had any luck with it.

 

[1507dennis]

Very cool and I want one!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[James-W]

I'm curious if you've got treads on your wheels or had any luck with it.

I am not exactly sure what you mean by "treads". If you mean the rubber rings that go around the two wheels and the blade rides over those, they were on the bandsaw when I bought it brand new and have never been replaced. They have never cause a problem either and I have had that bandsaw for many years. I don't use it much, but every once in awhile I need it for a project and then it is worth its weight in gold. Well, not really, if I had the weight of the bandsaw in gold I could hire all the jobs done and have a ton of money left over to buy more tools with.

 

[jweller]

Yeah The rubber rings on the wheels. Mine didn't have any and I bought replacements from Craftsman, but they get thrown off immediately.

 

[James-W]

The ones on my bandsaw were on there when I bought it. I am not certain how they stay in place, I guess I never really thought about it. Just offhand I would guess they are glued in place, or possibly they just fit very tightly to the wheel. Tomorrow I will take a closer look at them and maybe I will be able to tell for sure how they are attached. I'll let you know what I find out. I bowl in the morning so it will be afternoon before I get to check it out.

 

[aczr2k]

Yeah The rubber rings on the wheels. Mine didn't have any and I bought replacements from Craftsman, but they get thrown off immediately.

There is a guy on ebay (probably others as well) that sells urethane bands to replace those crappy rubber ones. I always had trouble with mine, replaced them and now its like a new saw.

 

[venturesomerite]

Lol, I like that it knocks them over, most of the ones I've seen load them sideways, that's cool.

 

[CNGsaves]

Cool can crusher . . . . rig the thing up with conveyor belt to carry cans up to big storage bin and shake them into really long pipe . . . then you've got a marketable product !!

Keep improving the mouse trap . . . . we like it !!

 

[James-W]

There is a guy on ebay (probably others as well) that sells urethane bands to replace those crappy rubber ones. I always had trouble with mine, replaced them and now its like a new saw.

I checked over the rubber bands on the bandsaw wheels and they seem to be really tight. At first I thought they might be glued on, but you can move them with a screwdriver and there is no glue residue on the rubber bands or on the wheels. So as far as I can tell, all they have is the tension from the rubber band itself to keep them in place. But I have had no problem at all with mine, they work just fine. In all fairness though, I do not use the bandsaw very much.

 

[James-W]

Keep improving the mouse trap . . . . we like it !!

I didn't really intend to make a "better mousetrap", all I wanted was to make a can crusher that we would use. The hand powered one we had worked just fine, but it was something that nobody wanted to use. I had been kicking around the idea in my mind for quite awhile and I just decided the time was right to build it.

If you are interested in stuff like this, I do have other things I have invented. I built lawnmower blade sharpener that can put an edge on a blade you could shave with. I built an electric heater that actually works better than a store-bought heater. I was heating my garage with it until I got the Hot Dawg heater that runs on natural gas. It worked so well I had to turn it off because it got too hot in the garage. I can show you some pictures if you want.

 

[Cole Trickle]

lol...so cool

 

[bsaint]

Put that bad boy on a VFD and crush twice as fast! Tim Allen style!

 

[tymbo]

BTW,those rubber bands are called tires.

Yeah The rubber rings on the wheels. Mine didn't have any and I bought replacements from Craftsman, but they get thrown off immediately.

 

[aluminum13]

Wonderful, simply wonderful. I'd make one simply to hear it run.

 

[805gregg]

You are drinking too much if you need that

 

[workbench]

That thing works great!
Saw this one on youtube:

 

[d_rock]

[/IMG]

 

[joebachor]

that is sweet !!!

 

[Redlunn]

Sweet can crusher. I'm not sure who created the original automatic can crusher but my dad built this in the mid 1980's. With minor maintenance it is still functional today. I have always wanted to build my own version which may be happening soon.