Patent ID: 9669410
Date: 2017-06-06
CPC Classifications: B02C,G01B

Claim:
1. A shredder comprising: a housing having a feed passage for receiving material to be shredded; a shredding machine received in the housing and including an electrically powered motor and cutters, the shredding machine enabling the material to be shredded to be fed into the cutters and the motor being operable in a shredding direction to drive the cutters to shred the material fed therein; a thickness gauging device configured to detect a thickness of the material to be shredded received by the feed passage; and a processor coupled to the motor and the thickness gauging device, the processor being configured to determine, prior to operation of the motor, whether the thickness gauging device detects that the thickness of the material to be shredded received by the feed passage is less than or greater than a capacity threshold thickness, and in response, (a) prevent operation of the motor if the thickness gauging device detects that the material to be shredded received by the feed passage is greater than the capacity threshold thickness; and (b) operate the motor in the shredding direction to drive the cutters to shred the material received by the feed passage if the thickness of the material is less than the capacity threshold thickness; wherein the thickness gauging device is deactivated by the processor during shredding until the material is shredded so that rippling or flapping of the material within the feed passage will not cause false readings as to the amount of material inserted into the feed passage.