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If ya gotta crush aluminum cans.....

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  1. #1
    NJSouth started this thread.
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    If ya gotta crush aluminum cans.....

    Not a BAD system... little slow for my liking but let me know what you think. Anyone have anything similar?
    LiveLeak.com - Can crusher demo.

    Oh and if you read the comments don't be drinking anything and prepare for your stomach to hurt!

    Last edited by NJSouth; 10-16-2014 at 01:01 PM.

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    saabsw's Avatar
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    I don't pick up cans, so my only source of cans is from my (bad) diet mountain dew habit, but I like to crush them by hand with gloves on. I figure it's a good forearm exercise.

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    Great idea, but I have a habit of crushing the can by hand before I can open the refrigerator for the next. one. And using a Gaylord to collect them instead of a tub makes less trips to the scrap yard. Gaylord of choice is old fertilizer containers. Can leave them outside without worrying about the weather.

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    harsas's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by NJSouth View Post
    Not a BAD system... little slow for my liking but let me know what you think. Anyone have anything similar?
    LiveLeak.com - Can crusher demo.

    Oh and if you read the comments don't be drinking anything and prepare for your stomach to hurt!

    I don't know, I think the speed is mostly the result of having to bend down and pick each can out of the grass...
    Have Fun,
    Harold

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    HipToScrapSquare's Avatar
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    Props to this guy for making that machine!
    Seems like all that electricity would be hellish overhead for one's business, and yes picking them up out of the grass would stink. Machine needs a hopper on top so they can be shoveled in.
    I have two other methods I like:
    1. A classic wall-mount manual crusher
    2. Dump the bag of uncrushed cans out on the sidewalk and let the kids go to town. They love it.
    [+]

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    Arrrrh!!
    I would reconfigure that into a wire crusher/stripper...
    A couple of things, actually several..
    1) If you pick up a can twice, you are doing twice the amount of work that you have too..
    Or in other words, you are getting half the amount of $$$ you can get for the same amount of work..

    2). You do not save much space by squashing them flat.

    3) When they bail squashed cans, the cans are not locked together as much and the bail can break, making extra work for the scrap dealers.

    4) Squashing cans with your foot can give you varicous veins, I think.

    5) leaving cans outside in the open is not a good idea, snails like beer too, then they poop in the cans, adding soil to the very clean quality Ali (that's a sin!)

    6) You can help things if you pick up the can, turn it upside down, shake to remove anything in it, squash it in the centre so the sides touch using two fingers and thumb, put it in the final resting place for the can.
    I use either a very large plastic cleansack, or a long tube of plastic obtained from the wrapper of house insulation, 'Rockwool' is what I think its called in the US of A (Fibreglass Batts here in NZ)

    7) If you do this, the cans are consistant. They 'lock together' like building blocks in the plastic sack and therefor save space. They also don't move around much. When you shake the sack, you can tell if there's anything else inthe sack.
    Like stones etc. You scrap dealer will thank you for that.
    When they pour the cans into the bailer, the cans will lock together again, when they are bailed, they will lock together into a very solid Ali block and not fall apart.

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    All of our cans go into a 40 gallon trash can in the garage. When it's full I dump the cans out in a line in the driveway and let the van squash'em.

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    No crushing cans for us! Gotta love that NY deposit/refund.

    The yard I go to only pays $0.40/pound for ‘refundable’ Aluminum cans so it’s just not worth it. There’s also a redemption center nearby that pays 6 cents per item instead of the normal 5 so that’s where all ours go. Much easier just to fill up garbage bags with aluminum cans and plastic bottles and not have to worry about sorting.
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    3) When they bail squashed cans, the cans are not locked together as much and the bail can break, making extra work for the scrap dealers.
    This I can attest too. Its the same for the cans crushed by those $3.00 hand crush mechanism's. I don't know how many bundles I've had fall apart from the smashed flat cans/crushed cans.

    though it takes longer to bail full on cans, those never break apart.
    Scrapper, Scrap Yard Worker, Horse farm worker, Cooler Puller and just plain ''tired''

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    Quote Originally Posted by newattitude View Post
    This I can attest too. Its the same for the cans crushed by those $3.00 hand crush mechanism's. I don't know how many bundles I've had fall apart from the smashed flat cans/crushed cans.

    though it takes longer to bail full on cans, those never break apart.
    My scale man has never complained to me about my smashing cans. I do it to save space and handling. Smashed they go for about 8-9 lb to a bag. full sized cans are only 5 lb to a bag.
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    That's a neat contraption - but looks like a lot of work. I use a wall-mount manual crusher. Also have a can crusher that is attached to the top of a can, the can get crushed and slides inside the bag in the can - like this one CanPactor Can Crusher (but I got it for free.

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    everyday i go on a 3 mile walk out here in the country. bar a block away they finish it off and out the window it go's and they start another one.
    anyway i take couple grocery bags walk along i find one i smash it with my foot and into the sack it go's. when i get home from what i collected i toss it into a 50 gallon plastic garbage can with a trash bag in it. when it gets full out to the storage shed it gos. i take mine in about once a year. every bit helps moneywise.

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  22. #13
    logansryche's Avatar
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    Hey this is a pretty cool idea, though I think I'd build a better crushing mechinism and feed chute(something along the lines of a wood splitter but with a ram instead of a wedge). It's stuff like this that gets my mind working lol.

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    I know smashed cans weigh more, I just dont like bailing them
    Last edited by newattitude; 10-25-2014 at 05:57 AM.

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    Honestly, there's a lot of space saved when you just squeeze the can in the centre so the sides touch.
    That way there's two open voids in the can only.
    The resulting shape of the can is conductive for the cans interlocking when placed in the bag.

    Then when they get poured into the bailer, they interlock again and when squashed into the cube, every can is interlocked togethet into a lump.
    Also, when you have a plastic bag full of interlocked cans, it dos't make as much noise and you can't hear cans shifting over each other in the bag.
    You can also hear that there's no water and no stones etc.

    I can still see the puzzeled look on the scale guys face as he picked up a bag of my cans and shook them.
    He KNEW there was something different about these cans....
    Quiet, little fluid, no stones and a solid plastic bag..... now that don't happen every day...

    He thanked me about it next time I came in.

    I'd really hate to bail a bunch of cans and then to shift them and cans fall out, which you have to pick up by hand and they are thin and hard to grab and its all around your ankles....

    All you have to do is, pick the can up from where you found it, turn it upside down and shake to remove anything in it, squash its sides in, with two fingers and thumb, chuck it into the bag that its going to the scrapdealers in.
    Preferrably into a tall bag, like what 'rockwool' (Pink Batts insulation here in NZ) insulation comes in.
    Try and get the bag back after its been emptyed, and make sure its not sticky or dirty when you use it again.
    A tall bag is so they can carry it on their shoulders and pour it into the machine in one go.
    It also uses up less floor space.
    With this way, you only pick up the can once, the bag twice, load, and unload.
    Last edited by eesakiwi; 10-25-2014 at 03:12 AM.

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    I have done it all from hand crushing, to stomping, to driving over them in the driveway. All that stopped for me about 2 years ago when someone opened a yard about a mile from the house. Now I can just drop them off on the way by if I have a large bag full.

    I still crush them partially by hand as they get used, so I end up with 5 or 6 bucks for a bag full. I rarely make a trip just for them, but it is nice to get that extra 5 bucks on top of the other 80 to 100 I am taking in.
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    If I had a pile like that I could put a big board over it and drive my truck onto it. I have looked at a ton of different home made can crushers but most seem to be more of a fun engineering adventure rather than true efficiency. My thought has always been if I had a large amount I could just put a board of a huge army tarp over them and drive back n forth then take a snow shovel n scoop em up
    Last edited by armstrt8; 10-26-2014 at 08:12 AM.

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    Quote Originally Posted by eesakiwi View Post
    Honestly, there's a lot of space saved when you just squeeze the can in the centre so the sides touch.
    That way there's two open voids in the can only.
    The resulting shape of the can is conductive for the cans interlocking when placed in the bag.

    Then when they get poured into the bailer, they interlock again and when squashed into the cube, every can is interlocked togethet into a lump.
    Also, when you have a plastic bag full of interlocked cans, it dos't make as much noise and you can't hear cans shifting over each other in the bag.
    You can also hear that there's no water and no stones etc.

    I can still see the puzzeled look on the scale guys face as he picked up a bag of my cans and shook them.
    He KNEW there was something different about these cans....
    Quiet, little fluid, no stones and a solid plastic bag..... now that don't happen every day...

    He thanked me about it next time I came in.

    I'd really hate to bail a bunch of cans and then to shift them and cans fall out, which you have to pick up by hand and they are thin and hard to grab and its all around your ankles....

    All you have to do is, pick the can up from where you found it, turn it upside down and shake to remove anything in it, squash its sides in, with two fingers and thumb, chuck it into the bag that its going to the scrapdealers in.
    Preferrably into a tall bag, like what 'rockwool' (Pink Batts insulation here in NZ) insulation comes in.
    Try and get the bag back after its been emptyed, and make sure its not sticky or dirty when you use it again.
    A tall bag is so they can carry it on their shoulders and pour it into the machine in one go.
    It also uses up less floor space.
    With this way, you only pick up the can once, the bag twice, load, and unload.
    I've found this is the best way, too. You'd never guess how much space this saves...crushing them completely doesn't really do much better. Of course, I need to keep the UPC readable so I can get my deposit, so crushing MI10 cans isn't an option and I'm biased.
    That said, while I've never encountered this in real life, I read a couple articles recently about how some yards don't like it when they're crushed, as that's often how people cram rocks and stuff into them and they can't tell. I suppose it's a YMMV thing.

    My grandparents used to line the garage floor with their cans when they'd babysit me after school so I could wear myself out jumping on them. Tons of fun, but now I see it holds more value as a method to wear a kid out.

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  29. #19
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    i put my heavy work boot on and flatten them...get about 15 to 17 pounds in a 30 gallon green trash bag...save money on less bags...they just pour into a gaylord at scrap yard

  30. #20
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    My approach is labor intensive and clearly not for everyone, but allows me to store a lot more UBCs in a smaller amount of space: 1. clean the can with rain water (stored or otherwise), 2. dry them out all the way, 3. crush the cans with a heavy weight vertically and batch a large amount of these in a box (10 - 20lbs worth), and then...4. hammer the cans on a full size anvil until they are close to paper thin, 5. put in a box.


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