Blendtec Blender for recycling flament... Worth it?

[pardonme]

I've found these blenders which are supposed to blend anything. I imagine they would work tremendously for blending old/useless 3D prints that I want to run through my filastruder and make new filament. Has anyone found a good blender that can shred filament rather nicely?

My buddy pointed me to Blendtec, and I must say I'm impressed by their videos. They range in prices for $279 for a refurbished model to $1500 for the top of the line. I'm thinking about getting one but wanted to see if anyone else has tried and succeeded with something a bit more affordable.

IN the video below they blend an iphone 5

[3dkarma]

The question I'd have is whether it will reduce the plastic to individual pieces small enough to go through the extruder. I don't have experience with these particular blenders, so can't really give any advice. Maybe look at some of the videos and see how small / fine the plastic comes out of them.

[old man emu]

This is the closest I could find as an example of blending ABS:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NrqHHBibRvs

OME

[Geoff]

The question I'd have is whether it will reduce the plastic to individual pieces small enough to go through the extruder. I don't have experience with these particular blenders, so can't really give any advice. Maybe look at some of the videos and see how small / fine the plastic comes out of them.

It wont, you need uniform pellets in most hoppers simply due to the silo design, and if it's a machine that can take that sort of raw plastic and re-extrude it, it would have to be a pretty beefy machine.

If you know of a filastruder that can take that sort of raw material, please let me know!

[midoco]

I have a Blendtec and may have to try it.

[3ddplas]

we are a plastic filament factory, we have lots of years experience producing.
I think the small kit your mension is too small and not that safe. as in plastic industrial ,we will use below machine to make big bulk plastic goods breaking to piece small enough to drop to
extruder.
the machine price range from $451 to $1935, I think the cheap one is power enough.
2012-11-022011730142717188.jpg
another choice, you can buy cheap filament from us directly from China .
$22 for 800gram, include shipping, tax free, go by post.

[3dkarma]

I've experimented with a blender trying to recycle PLA into something a filament extruder could take. I started by placing some pieces in a tray covered with non-stick baking paper, then baked at about 220 Celsius until they'd melted down to between 1 and 2 mm thick.

DSC_0047.jpg DSC_0049.jpg

The plastic was then placed in the freezer and once frozen, broken up by hand into more manageable pieces. Use gloves for this - the shards can be sharp.

DSC_0051.jpg

They were then blended in a cheap (£15) glass jug blender. I printed up some sieves of varying sizes (5mm, 7.5mm and 10mm) and sorted the output.

DSC_0052.jpg DSC_0053.jpg

The 10mm and above pieces are currently in the freezer waiting another run-through in the blender to get them to a size that will get through an extruder. I believe the 7.5mm and below will go through OK.