Destroying CDs and DVDs with nail polish remover.

[dos-man]

Get rid of your old CDs and DVDs in a hurry with my proven
technique

Soak them for 24 hours in nail polish remover. Keep the container
with a lid on it so that the nail polish remover doesn't evaporate and
you can reuse it over and over again. Let them dry for about 24
hours. The nail polish remover eats the plastic. They will warp and
become as brittle as a cracker.

 

[John McGaw]

24 hours to soak and then 24 hours to dry doesn't seem very
fast, you can break them in half immediately or put them in
a microwave oven and see a light show for the couple seconds
it takes to destroy them.

Typical discs are made of polycarbonate IIRC, which doesn't
dissolve in the typical acetone solvent in nail polish
remover. Are your discs a different material or the nail
polish remover a different formulation? Then again I have
not soaked polycarbonate for 24 hours, maybe it's the length
of time that matters?

The coating over the metal might degrade, I don't know it's
formulation, then the unprotected metal might oxidize
rendering it incapable of being read due to deformation of
the pits but I don't know if it would happen sufficiently in
24 hours.

Right you are. Acetone would probably work to dissolve the lacquer coating
from the label side of a CD and that might eventually destroy it but I
don't see a DVD being affected much since it is a polycarbonate sandwich
structure with the reflective coating internal. Far easier to pop either
type of disk into the microwave, set it for 10 seconds and press START.
Nobody in the world will be able to recover anything after that. Of course
now that I have a heavy-duty confetti shredder I can simply pop either sort
of disk into that and it is gone. Not as much fun as the microwave but at
least I don't have to walk to the kitchen to use it.

 

[Dos-Man 64]

24 hours to soak and then 24  hours to dry doesn't seem very
fast, you can break them in half immediately or put them in
a microwave oven and see a light show for the couple seconds
it takes to destroy them.

 Typical discs are made of polycarbonate IIRC, which doesn't
dissolve in the typical acetone solvent in nail polish
remover.  Are your discs a different material or the nail
polish remover a different formulation?  Then again I have
not soaked polycarbonate for 24 hours, maybe it's the length
of time that matters?

The coating over the metal might degrade, I don't know it's
formulation, then the unprotected metal might oxidize
rendering it incapable of being read due to deformation of
the pits but I don't know if it would happen sufficiently in
24 hours.

Well, when I saw fast, I don't mean timewise; I meant with minimal
effort. Anyway, 24 is generous. 12 hours for each cycle works fine.
This is also a clean technique. You don't get little gold particles
and plastic bits lying around (just some little bits of translucent
plastic bag material.)

They tend to warp into a U shape after they dry. While they are
drying they make snap-crackle-pop noises. And the plastic coating
underneath becomes thin and "cloudy" looking. They break incredibly
easy once dry. Not having more trouble with DVDs over CDs although the
manufacturer brand makes a bit of a difference in how many pieces you
can break them into. TDKs can be broken up by hand into a million
little pieces, but some of the others can be cut into 6 or 8 pieces
and you need to use tools to further reduce them.

 

[Dos-Man 64]

 I just feed mine to my shredder.
The better ones have slots for credit cards, CD/DVD's, as well as for
paper.  Much faster and no harsh chemicals or smoke to deal with.

True no pretty light show as with the microwave but no residue
contamination of the oven either.

Well, I'm not up for the microwave. Sounds dangerous. I was going to
buy a shredder, but I've got about 800 of them here collected over
many years. I just didn't the shredder would be up to the challenge.
I tried sanding them, but that was very messy and hard work.

 

[Dos-Man 64]

no way am I going to breathe in those harmful fumes

as Kony said: it takes a just a second to break them

Well, I don't keep the container anywhere where the fumes are a
problem. I actually hide the container in the garage while they
"soak". And there's a tight lid on the container, so the stuff does
not evaporate. It's only a small container. I do them in batches of
25