The Process
Before the fun part of melting, I need to clean and sort a HEAP of plastic lids. While my base material may be free, but it certainly costs me in time!
Before the melting and creating can begin, I first need to clean and sort all the plastic lids.
These need to be sorted into plastic type and colour as well as filtering out any other random finds e.g. rubbish, pens, screws, batteries, bread tags, bullet casings, etc, because believe me, they have been in there.
Once sorted, I clean the lids. To do this I put them into a big rubbish bin filled with hot water and dishwashing liquid then agitate them for around 15 minutes. I put them into mesh bags and hang them up to dry.
Once the lids are completely dry I can take them to my shredder, Edward Scissor Hands, and start shredding. I do this one colour at a time, making sure to clean the shredder in between colours so each colour doesn't become contaminated with another.
Once the lids are all processed I can mix up my colour range and then can begin melting. There's a few different ways that this gets done.
-
Injection Machine (I call this one Paul)
-
Small sheets or slabs
-
Free form
Injection Machine - Paul
I first pour the shredded plastic into the injection machine. It can take 8-10 minutes to melt inside the machine
I have pre-made moulds made from sheet metal for the sandwich style moulds or milled aluminium. These are bolted together before the plastic is injected or squeezed into them.
Sheets or Slabs
I use a panini press to melt the shredded plastic into sheets. Once a sheet has cooled down I can draw my design on and cut it out using my scroll saw.
Free Form
I can melt the plastic again using the panini press. I put on thick silicone gloves and can shape the plastic into different shaped blobs.
You can see more of these processes on my Instagram page
https://www.instagram.com/p/DCnQG-GyI_X/