Grinding

Aug 08, 2006 7 Replies

Yes, I know this may be a bit off topic, but does anyone have any ideas on grinding expanded polystyrene. Im trying to turn it into a dust essentially, and have found I can achieve what i want by using an orbital sander with a dust extractor, but this is very very slow. I have mad e acrude kind of grinder, similar to the old fashioned grinders used for flour,but not with a huge amount of success. Any other clever ideas ?



I have tried all the usual kitchen gadgets and implements btw. I need to grind it to a very very fine dust, so none of the kitchen gadgets seemed to work well enough


Thanks


Try a garden shredder & the neighbours will think it's snowing

AWEM

Do-It-Yourself parting dust?

How fine do you need it? Would a coarse belt on a belt sander (linisher?) work for what you want? For this, I would consider slowing the surface speed way down, to keep the heat down at the workface.

Cheers Trevor Jones

Orbital sanders are not good in removing material, but in making smooth surfaces. Get a normal rotating sander (angle grinder) or a belt sander. A belt sander would be better, because you can keep the surface temperature of the media down.

Nick

Nick you can't use an angle grinder, I'm working with this stuff at the moment, and it just melts it inside a second.

Michael

First, try putting the ps pieces in the freezer before comminution. Also, be very careful as a"very very fine"(sic) ps dust will be a signficant fire or even explosion hazard around unshielded electric motors.

Maybe if you let us know what you intend to do with this dust we may be able to help more?

Greg

Does it have to be EPS? Polyurethane foam breaks into fine dust with great abandon when machined. DAMHIKT.

Mark Rand RTFM

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