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Industrial Shredders – Why Allegheny Shredders Is the World’s Greatest

Industrial Shredders come in all shapes and sizes. Why are Allegheny Shredders considered the best in the world? Over 50 years ago, Allegheny founder John Wagner began breaking the barrier, building an industrial shredder to out-perform a powerful 7.5 horsepower shredder already on the market. In 1971, he went one step further and introduced the first heavy duty industrial shredder in the industry – a 15 horsepower beast! This trend continued into the present day, as Allegheny now manufacturers 300 HP industrial shredders and shredding systems that can produce 20 tons of shredded paper per hour.

Mr. Wagner didn’t only build higher horsepower industrial shredders than anyone, he also improved the cutting assembly to make them as efficient as possible. Allegheny began using the original Saw-tooth cutter, which aggressively pulls paper into the cutting assembly, adding more throughput to the shredder as well as cutting down on its ability to jam.

Mr. Wagner also designed the indestructible T-18 cutter, made of the highest impact-resistant tool steel. This cutter has been revolutionary in the high capacity paper shredding industry, as it withstands the heaviest shock loads and most abusive applications, essentially eliminating cutter breakage. Milled only for Allegheny, this cutter technology makes Allegheny stand out from the rest of its competitors.

As the industrial shredders continued to get bigger, the need for material handling equipment to keep up with the capacities of these industrial shredders became a must. That’s when Mr. Wagner developed the first automatic feed system for high volume, heavy duty industrial shredder systems. Having grown up on a farm throughout his life, Mr. Wagner got the idea for Allegheny’s current Auto-Feed™ System from a manure spreader.

He used the concept from that manure spreader to create an industrial shredder feeding system that virtually eliminates jams by creating a consistent even flow of paper, and also minimizes the need for multiple operators to feed the shredder, as well as the fatigue and strain that comes with manually feeding paper into a shredder all day long. This innovation has led to fully automated Allegheny paper shredding systems that can do more tons per hour than any other manufacturer!

Allegheny Shredders has continued to evolve through its 50 plus years in information destruction, becoming the only manufacturer in the industry that builds all 5 types of shredding technologies for plant-based industrial shredders – Strip Cut, Cross-Cut, Cross-Shred, Particle Cut, and Single Shafter Grinders. Highly popular among our technology companies is purchasing our hard disk shredders which effectively destroys beyond recognition hard disks filled with sensitive data.

Customers in the contract paper shredding business have many different needs based on the level of security of their client requires, and Allegheny provides industrial shredders that destroy paper to whatever shred size is desired. Allegheny builds shredders to cover the standards of the National Association of Information Destruction (NAID) for Strip Cut, Cross-cut, Pierce and Tear, and Grinding, as well as complying with HIPPA Privacy and Security Rules for destroying health information.

Having built custom industrial shredders for many different security agencies, Allegheny has the experience and knowledge to make sure the customer gets the exact type of shredding technology they need for their contract shredding service clients.

Even though Allegheny Shredders is considered the World’s Greatest Manufacturer of Plant-Based Shredding Equipment (see video here), Mr. Wagner had the foresight to realize that bailing your shredded paper and selling it to a paper broker could be a very profitable revenue stream, whether it be from a customers industrial shredders or their mobile shredding trucks. He also realized that building an in-ground pit within a customer’s facility could be very costly and sometimes not possible if they do not own their facility. So, in order to reap the benefits of selling paper, as well as saving the cost of digging a pit, Mr. Wagner created a more efficient way to dump mobile trucks after they had been filled from shredding paper all day – an Off-Loading System for Mobile Shredding Trucks.

This two-conveyor system has a primary conveyor that shredded paper from the trucks is discharged into, and then a secondary, inclined metering conveyor that feeds the shredded paper directly into a baler. Customers can incorporate their Off-Loading System for Mobile Shredding Trucks with their Allegheny Industrial Shredder to dump their truck and shredder both into the same baler, providing a cost-effective solution to for their contract paper shredding business.