Sun Joe SDJ616 13-Amp Electric Leaf Mulcher/Shredder 13-Amp 16:1 Reduction Ratio, 8,000-RPM, Mulch up to 55-Gallons per Minute, Adjustable Control Dial

I had a whole bunch of weeds come up after the rains in the areas that were mulched. With intermittent rain, I could not get to them till last week, by which time they were all about 1½ feet tall! After pulling them out by the roots, I decided to use my Patriot Shredder to grind up this stuff. I have had the Patriot for several years, and it has been great for chipping and shredding broken branches and after pruning the hedges. It gets through dry and wet branches with ease, as long as I don't "choke" the machine with too much stuff at one go. Well, I put the fresh, long weeds through the top hopper, and it just would not suck the stuff down. I then used the chipper opening, and there was nothing coming out of the discharge chute. The machine bogged down and stopped. I found the entire flywheel, hammers, and chipper blade coated with wet green "mush". The machine just could not handle this stuff. It took me about an hour just to clean out the Patriot. I was looking for an alternative, so read some reviews, and decided to go with the SunJoe Shredder. Most reviews were negative regarding "wet" stuff, but I was willing to give it a try, especially with the price being less than $100.00. I used the cloth bag from my Patriot Chipper and it was a perfect fit! I would strongly recommend you use some sort of "cloth" bag. Plastic bags tend to get ripped if there are stems or twigs. Paper bags tend to rip when you are trying to secure them, and it is hard to get the right size. The elastic cord is very tight, and in the process of pulling the bags to fit around the bottom flange you will end up ripping the bag. The Patriot bag is a heavy gauge synthetic material and is "breathable" so as the bag fills up, air can be pushed out. The bag can also be reused for many years. The bag is expensive, about ½ the price of the shredder, but I think it would be worth the price if you are planning on doing a lot of shredding. It is available here on Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Patriot-Products-888000100-Shredder-Collection/dp/B004W5YKBE/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1437233760&sr=8-3&keywords=Patriot+Shredder. The bag has a cord which cinches the opening of the bag. The bag is an almost an exact fit for the bottom of this shredder. I hook one edge under the bungee cord, and then work my way around the bottom rim with the bag. Then I just cinch up the bag with the built in tie. The bag works well with dry or wet material. I already had the bag, so it wasn't an issue. This bag has held up for several years, chipping branches so should hold up with shredding leaves. If cost is an issue, I would suggest you look for other re-useable "cloth" bags. It makes it a lot easier to use this machine. Back to the review of this machine: I was apprehensive about how this would perform, but with care, and slow feeding, it ground up all the fresh weeds and stems without an issue. It does get clogged up after about 10 minutes. It is easy enough to stop the machine, and reach in from the top and scrape off the accumulated "mush" and push it down through the opening into the bag. It never tripped the circuit breaker, but I was careful about how much I put in. I filled up 4 bags of this mushy green ground up weeds, and all of it went straight into my composter! I changed the "string" on one side because it was becoming short. I wish they had put the blade that cuts the string our further, so that the string could reach a little wider in the hopper. As it is, there is about a ¾ inch gap between the end of the string and the sides of the hopper, and this is where stuff builds up. Not a big deal, but an annoyance. I am very pleased with the way this made short work of grinding up this wet stuff. As a bonus, it was ready for the compost! If you work within it's limitations, it is a great machine. I cannot vouch for it's longevity, but it has already been worth it. My only advise is to get a cloth bag, unless you really need to put stuff in paper bags for disposal. If you have a composter, you would not need to worry about disposal either. Guide to images (for some reason the order of the images changed after it was posted and I can't change the order, so follow the numbers to the right image): 5. Weeds growing in front of hedging - looks like tall grass 3. Sun Joe Shredder with Patriot cloth bag attached 1. Shredder, cart with weeds to be shredded. Please note the gloves, goggles, and ear protection - makes quite a bit of noise 2. String and internal blade that cuts string to length. The gap between the outside of the blade and the hopper is where stuff builds up 4. Size of shredded material. Note: one or two long stems get through unscathed 6. Composter with material from three cart loads of weeds (please refer to picture #3 for "one" cart load). Nice reduction in volume.

The assembly was a whiz. Putting in new plastic shredding line is easy and new ones can be easily purchased on- line for relatively cheap. The box comes with a very good supply of them. The shredder operates in a similar manner to a weed whacker, but it is quadruple lined and more powerful. I have run my Sun Joe shredder for several hours this past fall and this winter and it is marvelous. I have shredded perhaps 20 packed garbage cans full of leaves, mostly dry ones, and maybe four cans of plant stems. My wildflower plant stems are pretty hard but the shredder gets through them! I go through more plastic line shredding stems than shredding leaves. With dry leaves, I can shred many garbage cans full of leaves before the line gets worn out. Wet leaves will kind of stick to the inside of the shredder and it is best to clean it out every several minutes, but it will still run. Don’t expect to machine to break any hard sticks, even small ones. Occasional small sticks will generally get through the shredder with minimal damage to the shredding lines. The machine is quite loud and it is wise to have good ear protection. Over all, it is a great investment for what it does. I put all of my shredded leaves and stems on my many flower beds!

I bought this leaf mulcher to use on small yard waste - green leafy plant material. It was easily assembled and adjusted. The height adjustment is my favorite feature, actually - it allows you to adjust it to fit any sized bin, bag, or bucket you want to place beneath it to catch your shredded leaves. There are elastic bands along the bottom rim of the mulcher part that allow you directly attach a refuse bag as well. Likewise, it's easily disassembled for cleaning and/or storage. It's lightweight so it's easily moved wherever you'd like to use it but the attached power cord is extremely short so plan ahead with a long extension cord if you don't want to use it pressed up against the side of your house. My problem with this is that your leafy material really needs to be completely dry or you have to stop it and clear the mechanism of buildup fairly regularly. Any sort of stringy green stuff will wrap around the spinning mechanism (I was shredding dead bird of paradise stalks and leaves) and will bind up the shredder. If I'd had time to let these completely dry out, I think this device would've functioned better but I did not. Also, this is basically a stationary weedwhacker/edger on legs - which I wasn't expecting. It has plastic strings that do the mulching of the items you drop in and, as such, they have to be replaced. Unfortunately, they don't seem to have the longevity of the strings in my weedwhacker and I had to replace them twice (so went through 3 sets) in the process of mulching a half bin of green waste. Thankfully, this comes with several replacement sets of strings (I think I have 3 more sets of 2 in the bag) so I was able to complete my task without having to run to the nearest big home store for replacement strings. I'm hoping that I can find more durable strings to fit this because these are very disappointing. All in all, it functions but it could definitely be improved.

This thing is a monster. I previously owned a Sears leaf whacker that finally gave up the ghost after 20 yrs. I chose the Snow Joe for it's reviews and motor size, it requires a larger extension cord (12 ga) than most for the higher current it draws. I was disappointed when came I tried to assemble it, the mating halves did not fit as the upper funnel section was out of round. I wrestled it into place and put it to work. The telescoping legs were slipping occasionally requiring me to re-lock them but the feature allowed me to adjust it perfectly to straddle a Rubbermaid "Brute" 20 gal trash can. It's important to get the bottom of the shredder as close to the barrel to contain the chopped leaves. The small 20 gal barrel was perfect for lifting and emptying into a leaf bag using a plastic funnel made for this purpose. - Now for the good part, this thing is a monster. I had a ton of maple leaves to shred and it had been raining recently making all the leaves at the bottom damp. The Snow Joe didn't care, nor did it mind the small green twigs that are difficult to filter out of your pile either. You can tell it has lots of power when you have to wait several seconds for the motor to stop after you turn in off. The shredder comes with spare nylon cutting strings but the original set lasted the entire clean-up. Another complaint was with the course/fine control. The shutter is slightly warped causing it to hang on one of the finger guides resulting in a snapping noise when it finally pops into place. I can live with it but better quality control is needed. So why the 5 stars? Purely on ability, this is an extremely powerful shredder which is enough for me to recommend it.

I'd actually go with 3 1/2 stars. [edit] No, I wouldn't. 1 star. What this is: it is an electric string-trimmer (like a weed-eater) mounted on legs with a large funnel, designed to shred dry leaves. Use: you dump leaves (not sticks) in from the top, a shower of "mulch" shredded leaves falls out the bottom. Positives: it does what it's supposed to fairly well, can even handle moderately small sticks. Negatives: the biggest negatives hav to do with the motor. The electric motor is air-cooled, and has a small air-filter to keep it clean. Unfortunately it becomes clogged pretty fast. (see photos) The air filter is a rectangular black foam sponge. It traps dust and leaf particles, keeping them out of the motor. Unfortunately - at least on mine - the funnel leaks right over the air filter, so it clogs quickly causing the motor to overheat and shut down. What I've done: I made a PVC pipe rack that fits a 96Gal rolling trash bin, that the Shredder sits on. I cut up a rubber floor mat to fit over some of the open parts of the trash can, to keep dust down. I used blue painter's tape (it was handy) to tape over areas that "leaked" leaf particles to help keep the filter clean, I also used clear box tape to tape the funnel to the body of the shredder. Working this way I was able to shred for about 2 hours straight without the motor having problems at all, before that it shut down with a clogged air filter in less than 30 minutes. [edit] After using it for a second season, it began overheating in minutes. I've kept sticks out of it, but the few small ones caused the ALL PLASTIC HOUSING to CRACK and SHATTER. This allowed leaf shreds and dust to be sucked into the motor. Upon taking the housing apart to clean inside, I find that the power leads to the brushes for the motor aren't even connected properly. They could have spent 2 cents more soldering the contacts/clips that hold the brushes in place onto the power wires - but they didn't. It's hard to see here (last two photos) but the contact wires are balled-up with the brush wires and sandwiched with the clip that holds the brush-springs in place. That the plastic housing broke as it did is a debatable flaw; that the power feeds are improperly attached is laziness and shortcuts in manufacturing.

Great product for the price. What do you expect for $123 bucks delivered? I followed some other reviews and used some scrap plywood, cut a hole in it, and put the shredder in it on a 96 gal. trash can. Pictures show how much I shredded on the ‘fine’ setting in 35 minutes. I used leaf scoops to put large batches in the hopper. I temporarily put duct tape around the opening to keep dust from escaping. I’ll add some kind of seal, because it really made it pretty dust free. It also kept the dust out of the filters, another common complaint. I would hate to use bags, because it seemed a pain to attach and you would be changing them frequently. You have to push them in like a garbage disposal, being careful to not go past the lip where the trimmer strings are. But I shoved a lot in and it took it. Would be much faster if I had someone to push it in while I scooped, but even with one person it worked well. One frequent complaint is frequent string changes. But for the large pile I shredded (see pictures) the trimmer string was barely worn. I did make sure to pick out sticks as much as possible. Overall, a good product to mulch or just reduce space for disposal. It is homeowner quality, so don’t expect a commercial type product for $123.

Overall the thing works. I didn't have problems assembling the thing (unlike others). But I can confirm the extendable legs' fixtures may not hold well in place. You need to apply extra (not excessive, though) force to tighten them up. It can shred leaves (both dry and wet ones) pretty effectively. The 16:1 reduction rate is an overstatement, though. I could barely see about 3:1 (at most). I guess, this ratio represents the number of shredded bags of leaves I will get out of the original volume. No, nowhere close to that. 12 gal/min shredding speed seems to be a little exaggerated, too. It took us about an hour to get through two 50 gal bags (and there were 2 of us working). Also, not sure about the shredding speed. You can get a 'continuous' shredding only if you put a handful of leaves in (literally), any more and you gotta wait until they're done. The whole body is plastic and the security cover is held in place by plastic pieces. It's not easy to get the cover off without braking those small plastic pieces. I already (after 3 uses) have one broke off. The overall process gets really messy. The dust will cover you head to toe, so make sure you wear your work clothes (I really mean that). And, of course safety glasses and gloves are a must. Sometimes small pieces fly back out, so safety first! Oh, and it makes perfect sense to get those dust masks (not to breath that dust which flies around). As it was mentioned, the protective cover of the on/off buttons is not too soft, so turning the thing on/off with your gloves on is a bit hard. The shredded is pretty noisy. Make sure you don't work too late. Now, the plastic line used to shredding is okay against plain leaves. If you start getting twigs, the line breaks pretty quickly. It gets shorter and shorter and you start getting leaves accumulating under the cover. Yes, it can handle thin twigs, but at a cost. And you have to replace the line more often. Basically, it's not a bad thing. But given the ratios above (and extra time to shred, and the cost of electricity) you better do you math if you need those savings or just want to have your leaves collected w/o shredding. By the way, you can't have a full 50 gal bag of shredded leaves, it's too heavy and most likely won't be picked up by your refuse service. I guess, if you only need to shred some leaves for your compost heap or to add to mulch it may make sense to get something cheaper. And if you're looking to save on leaf bags... not sure if this will deliver huge savings.

After some online research looking at Flowtron and WORX, I concluded that Flowtron burns out motors too fast, and WORX does not have an adjustment for how finely or coarsely it shreds the leaves, and the gauge of the trimmer line it uses is too small. Since the first problem with the WORX was not that big a problem for me, and there was a simple modification described to retrofit the WORX to use a heaver line, and I have a WORX blower/vac combination that has worked well for several years, I decided to order the WORX. As I was in the process of placing the order, an add for the Snow Joe shredder popped up. I was not previously aware of it's existence, but I bought a Snow Joe electric chain saw last year and was very impressed with both the quality of the saw and the service from the company. Looking into the Snow Joe, I found that it used the heavier gauge shredding line, and had an adjustment for fine/coarse shredding. I changed my order to the Snow Joe. With Amazon Prime it came in two days. It was well packaged, assembled easily (10 minutes), and ran for about 6 hours over 2 days producing about 10 large trash bags of finely mulched oak leaves. It handled twigs in the leaves up to about a quarter of an inch in diameter with no problem. Adding bigger twigs forces you to change out the shredding lines more frequently. I replaced the mulching lines 3 times during the entire shredding process. Line replacement is simple (5 minutes) and does not require any tools. Overall the shredder worked very well. It shredded levees about as fast as I could bend down and pick them up out of a pile and load them in the shredder. My experience is with dry oak leaves, and for those, the shredder worked great. When I was done, I found that the shredder disassembles easily and packs into a very small volume for storage.

El equipo hace el trabajo aceptablemente bien, sin embargo, no es un equipo para uso intensivo por lo que para obtener la mayor efectividad en su desempeño hay que observar constantemente la velocidad con la que se alimenta el embudo de llenado para obtener el mejor corte posible y así prolongar la vida de los plásticos cortadores; de otra forma, si se sobrealimenta por tener mayor rendimiento del equipo, los plásticos cortadores se consumen muy rápidamente y el corte es disparejo. Importante tener en cuenta que lo ideal es alimentar al equipo con hojas únicamente, es decir, es deseable también depurar las varas, por muy delgadas que éstas sean porque también acaban rápidamente con el plástico cortador.

Endlich mal eine Arbeitserleichterung Wir haben in unserem Garten einen sehr großen Walnussbaum Jedes Jahr kommen ca 20-25 Säcke Laub zusammen Auch das zerkleinern mit dem Rasenmäher war keine Erleichtung Dieses Gerät schafft es aber in binnen kurzer Zeit das Laub zu feinem Mulch zu verarbeiten Top Volumenreduktion und super Zeitersparnis Wir sind begeistert

Seller must tell clearly its 110Volt AC, USA supply style, but total Product is Made in China ! Moreover, the Voltage converter provided for 220V AC to 110V AC, is only 100W rating where as if you see 110V x 13 A current, 60Hz, the power drawn is very high. The Converter provided Burnt in 5 min of use.

I've just received this shredder but it comes with a Canadian plug and is rated 110V, which means it is useless in the UK. No mention of any of this in the description. Baffled why this is even listed on Amazon.co.uk, it is just pointless. I'm obviously returning it and now have to go through the hassle of packing it up and bringing it to a drop-off point. Annoyed.

We are using it to chop straw for mulch and to mix into our garden soil to help aerate it and hold moisture. We have probably chopped 40-50 bales with no issues. It just takes a standard weed trimmer line which is handy. The only thing I would suggest is that anything you put through it should be dry. If you have wet material it sticks to the sides and you end up having to turn it off and scrape it out.