Awesome Recycling

Do you do a lot of 3D printing? Buying filament all the time can add up – never mind that it can be wasteful. The Loop is an upcoming desktop gizmo that can take bits of PLA, ABS, or PET-G printer waste and shred, heat, and extrude them into fresh filament. Its maker is accepting early reservations for the device with $100 down and a sub-$1500 launch price.

Artist Zak Miskry makes amazing metal sculptures of insects and animals from recycled electronics and scrap metal. In this video, he shows how he created a larger-than-life firefly that lights up like the real thing. It was a painstaking process to pick and place all the right parts, but the finished sculpture was worth the effort.

Steel isn’t only strong; it’s one of the world’s most recyclable materials. In this video from Knives Project, he shows how he took a rusty leaf spring from a car’s suspension, heated it and reshaped it into a hunting knife. After hammering the glowing strip of steel, he ground its edges and honed it into a beast of a knife that would make Crocodile Dundee proud.

Rubber is a versatile material and relatively easy to recycle. This video posted by Handmade Heroes shows how it’s possible to recycle rubber to make tennis balls. The process involved shredding the tire and mixing it with a binding agent. After that, he rolled the rubber like dough, shaped it into spheres, and covered the balls with flocking.

Trees decorated with colorful glass heart ornaments have always greeted guests at the four all-inclusive Pueblo Bonito beach resorts and Quivira Golf Club in Los Cabos. It’s a heartwarming tradition that starts with empty bottles. Pueblo Bonito guests go through two tons of beverage bottles a week.

This blacksmithing video from Knives Project starts with the satisfying process of ripping apart a molten-hot ball bearing to steal its outer ring. Then, he proceeds to forge and hammer the piece into a flat bar and grind it into a very large blade. The finished piece is somewhere between the size of a bowie knife and a machete.

In 2020, more than 120 billion pieces of cardboard were used to pack and ship items in the U.S. – and that number keeps growing. Cardboard is also one of the world’s most successfully recycled materials. New Mind digs into the history, science, and success of the ubiquitous corrugated paper.

Jake Carlini wanted a motorcycle but didn’t have the budget to buy a real one. Instead, he decided he’d build his own using various bits of junk and trash he found in his garage. He made its frame out of steel signposts and scrap wood and powered it with a cheap electric scooter motor from China.

We’re absolutely wild about things that keep everything in its right place. Jason from Epic Upcycling shows off an amazing build – a custom rack for all of his woodworking tools. It’s an impressive piece of cabinetry, and he made it entirely from scrap wood he harvested from shelving units he used to have in his workshop.

Our ability to reclaim and reuse metal means it’s possible to make knives and tools out of all kinds of stuff. Knives Project shows us how they burnt the explosive coating off a bunch of sparklers, then twisted and forged the remaining metal rods to create a uniquely patterned blade.

We love how metal can be used over and over again. After one object has served out its life, it can often be melted down and turned into something new. In this clip by metalsmith Random Hands, he shows us how he took a rusty link from an old piece of ship’s chain and hand-forged it into a beautiful new samurai sword.

One of the coolest things about metal is that it can be heated over and over again to make new things. My Mechanics, shows us how they transformed an ordinary steel nut into a tool that can turn nuts. The miniature wrench they made can grab onto nuts up to 8.5 mm across.

Random Hands shows how they turned a stack of stainless steel rulers into a unique Damascus pattern, which he sandwiched around high-carbon steel to make a beautiful Japanese-style meat cleaver. He fitted it with a hexagonal wood handle and a hand-stitched leather sheath. We’d love this knife in our kitchen, but sadly, this one isn’t for sale.

When is a fire extinguisher not a fire extinguisher? When it’s designed to stoke a flame instead of putting it out. Ollari’s took an empty old fire extinguisher, polished off its paint, and sliced it down the middle – turning its bottom half into a grill and its top half into its lid. The chainlink hinges are a clever design touch.

We’ve seen how rebar is made; now watch how these metal reinforcing rods get a second chance at life after they’ve been bent. Created by JP Botelho, this machine can take even severely mangled lengths of rebar and literally set them straight. It’s an oddly satisfying process to watch.

The energy sword from Halo is the game franchise’s ultimate melee weapon. We’ve seen a number of real-life replicas of the sword over the years, now here’s another take on the weapon. Random Hands started out with a rusty old leaf spring from a truck, which he cut, forged, hammered, and split down the middle to form the two halves of the blade.