Homemade Plastic Extrusion System

This is a system I made in a quest to produce growing media from plastic resin (HDPE) for my Aquaponic system. To help support future videos, please rate provide a "thumbs up" rating and subscribe to my channel. Some of the video is poor since I originally didn't plan on posting this info! If system looks like it was hacked together....some parts are. The controller is a Teensy with an AVR processor. Thumbs up for Legos!

PLEASE! Read through the comments since many of the questions you may have are answered here. Also there's a wiki about this at http://www.reprap.org/wiki/Web4deb Thanks.

Blog: http://web4deb.blogspot.com
Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/web4deb
Web site: http://www.BigelowBrook.com
Fecebook: http://www.Facebook.com/BigelowBrook

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• aquaponics
• hydroponics
• expanded
• clay
• growing
• media
• synthetic
• plastic
• HDPE
• resin
• DIY
• homemade
• organic
• gardening
• plants
• fish
• food
• farming
• lego
• legos
• teensy
• AVR
• controller
• micro
• processor
• extrusion
• extruder
• hydroton
• reprap
• 3d
• printer
• filament
• recycled
• Green

[randy12368]

The strips of plastic you have shown, can you tell me how wide they are? The reason for my asking is would you consider selling me some? I am thinking of insurting them into drinking straws and using them in a wet/dry sump for my aquarium.

[web4deb]

@randy12368 they are about 1/2" wide. They are not for sale. Sorry.

[sev07pass]

Actually I have a question, how do you get the plastic to the rollers when you are just starting the machine up? Toothpicks? Wtf?

[web4deb]

@sev07pass needle nose pliers work fairly well.

[ADHuss1]

web4deb great job, it's not crude it's just a prototype that could use some refindment. ;-) I would like to build one of these units to recycle plastic for my 3D printer. Any information you can get me on how to build one would be greatly appreciated. adhuss@hotmail.com

[web4deb]

@ADHuss1 someone on reprap.org created a wiki page that has a bunch of details on the extruder. Check it out first at reprap.org/wiki/Web4Deb_extrud­er.

[friingey]

@RANDY12368, sniffle

[ladedk]

Cool!!! Brillant design....

[randy12368]

If they are not for sale , dimensions don't matter.

[MrILLUMINATING]

Growing food in plastic...sounds like a recipe for cancer...

[qualitatserzeugnis]

Congratulations ! This is a simple and no expensive plastic extruder for entusiast creates their own plastic parts ! thank you for share it!!

[DDMetzler]

I'd been thinking about the same thing for a long time since I use HDPE to prototype parts on my mill and have boxes and boxes of shavings. Your design is much simpler and better than what I had been thinking of (pressurized vat) . I'm going to start on one immediately :-) Thanks for the inspiration!

[Chuck23250]

Man, that is the coolest home made project. Very impressive.

[Assi2004]

@krispykeithable u know that extruders are >100 years old? u know they recycle polymers, metalls etc.? well, now u know.

but do u know what u can do against this throw-away society? dont buye cheap crap! buy long live reliable things :)

but u woont, coz u want it to be maximum cheap so... whatever...