Paper Shredder problem with paper detect circuitry

It's a reflective optical sensor. Nothing more than an infra-red LED and a photodiode or phototransistor. If you have a CCD camera (webcam, camcorder, etc) you should be able to see the IR from the LED if it's working. Shorting across the phototransistor should activate the motor.

It may not be the sensor though, sometimes reverse is accomplished entirely through the mechanical switch, while forward is triggered by the electronics. Watch your fingers while working on these things.

So there is a manual reverse switch but no manual forward?

You could try shorting different pairs of wires that go to the sensor together. They are very low voltage/current and you've got nothing to lose if you aren't trying to repair it correctly. You could also try to determine the voltage/current requirements of the motor and rig up some external supply. Lost of things you could experiment with, just depends on your level of curiosity and ambition.

Thanks James, I will give shorting a shot since I have nothing to lose. First I will try looking at the sensor in action with thru my digital camera.

Thanks!

It has a REV OFF AUTO switch. I am assuming that if I can fake the paper sensor into working (all the time) I could leave the shredder in OFF position, and shred (continuously) when I put the shredder into AUTO, then just put to OFF when finished. No more autofeed, just straight OFF and continuous ON (in auto switch loaction). For all the shredding I do just having the equivalent to a manual REV OFF FWD is all I need. Actually I already bought a bigger shredder, but if I can fix it I can give it to my daughter instead of the dump. :)

Apparently parts are very hard to come by, especially for a machine several years old. If I break it, I break it. I have nothing to lose.

Thanks for your help.

Norm

You dont want a continous ON. It can overheat the motor and burn down your home, business etc...

Continuous on when NOT turned off, in otherwords it'll be on or off, no more automatic. When I need to shred I'll turn the machine on, then I'll turn it off. Just can't leave it in auto so I can just insert a page whenever and have it swallow.

I hooked up the paper sensor again and looked at it thru my camera, I can definitely see the I-R LED lighting up. So, I tried shorting the opposite pair to the side that I thought lit up, but nothing happened. Since I had nothing to lose I shorted the other pair, BINGO, the shredder works in AUTO (as if manual FWD) and REV, but not automatic, and the cutters don't run continuously either in any switch position. So I have all manual control, FWD, OFF, REV. Ceh la vie, at least it's useable this way. Thanks for everyones help!

maybe add a mechanical microwave timer to limit the 'on' time?! You see so many dumped microwaves , shame not to make use of some of those parts!

-B

:Hi, : :I have a Royal 80MX paper shredder that won't shred (go forward), it :goes backwards fine so the motor etc. are working OK. This just :happened suddenly last week. It's as if the paper detection circuit :doesn't recognize paper being inserted. I took it apart and their is a :small plug in connector on the main circuit board with 4 wires leading :to a small trianglular shaped component (numbered only 0321, which may :be a date code for all I know) with two wires going to each of what :looks like 2 small blue plastic lenses. I assume that when paper is :inserted a circuit (of light?) is broken telling the machine to turn :on and shred in automatic mode. I found nothing on the other side of :the paper entrance, so maybe it bounces light off of the chromed :roller. Anyway, getting a replacement part will be impossible, but... :if I knew how this actually worked I could maybe short out the sockets :on the main board to make it think/detect there is always paper in it :so it would always work, then I could just turn it off to stop it, and :turn it on when I wanted to shred. : :Any thoughts? : :TIA! : :Norm

Usually, reversing a shredder is independant of the paper sensor. The paper sensor only detects whether paper is inserted for shredding and the motor always goes forward automatically. Only on paper jams does the motor need to reverse, and that is accomplished by a manually operated reversing switch. That's how it works on my old Fordigraph 100 Auto anyway.