Abstract: In order to reclaim tobacco purely and efficiently from waste cigarettes with special filters, a filter separator was designed. The separator consists of a sorting feeder, a conveying passage, a hopper, and an orientation and separation mechanism (including a cutting drum, an optical fiber color detector, an air jet, and cutoff knives). The sorting feeder has two bypass channels with outlets to discharge detached filters and tobacco rods separately in advance. After going through the conveying passage and the hopper, the remaining waste cigarettes drop successively into the right end of the cutting drum grooves. Each cigarette is subjected to an orientation check by the optical fiber color detector, cigarettes with outward tobacco end shall be blown by the air jet to the left end of the drum groove. Finally, the filters are cut off from the left and right rows of cigarettes separately by the cutoff knives. The designed filter separator was tested on "Diamond (Soft Lotus)" brand cigarettes with activated carbon filters in Zhangjiakou Cigarette Factory. The results showed that after the application of the filter separator, the time required for disassembling waste cigarettes was saved by about 7.19 hours per shift, the running speed was about 126 cigarettes per minute, and the rate of filter residue after processing was less than 0.3%. This technology supports the promotion of processing efficiency of waste cigarettes with special filters.