Blade count gets most of the attention when people shop for a shredder, but mesh size is just as important — arguably more so, since it directly determines the size of the flake that comes out the other end.
What Mesh Size Actually Does
The mesh (or sieve) sits underneath the shredding chamber. Plastic gets shredded repeatedly until it's small enough to pass through the mesh holes, then it drops out as finished flake. A smaller mesh (like 6mm) produces finer, smaller flake. A larger mesh lets bigger pieces through faster, producing coarser flake.
Why It Matters More Than You'd Think
- Finer flake (smaller mesh) melts more evenly and consistently in extrusion and injection molding, which means fewer clogs and more predictable results
- Coarser flake (larger mesh) shreds faster since material passes through sooner, but can cause uneven melting or inconsistent product quality downstream
- Mesh size also affects shredding speed — finer mesh means material has to be shredded more before it passes through, which takes longer per batch
Matching Mesh to Your Process
All of our shredders run a 6mm mesh as standard, which is a solid middle ground for most Precious Plastic-style workflows — fine enough for consistent extrusion and injection results, without shredding so slowly that throughput suffers.
If you're doing compression molding (sheets, tiles) rather than extrusion or injection, you may have more flexibility on flake size since compression is less sensitive to particle consistency than extrusion or injection.
Mesh Size and Blade Count Work Together
These two specs aren't independent — see our blade count comparison for how they interact. More blades combined with a fine mesh gives you the most consistent flake, but also the slowest throughput. Fewer blades with the same mesh means slower cutting per rotation but can still hit the same final flake size.
Not Sure What Your Process Needs?
If you're not sure whether 6mm mesh fits what you're building, tell us your end product and we'll help you figure out the right setup. Contact us — we'd rather get you the right machine the first time.
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