Hello!

From the beginning of building my shredder I wanted to be able to produce plastic sheets in the end. Here is why: I love the Preciousplastic project, because it enables everybody with money and time to recycle plastic him- or herself. However, as you can read in my shredder-build-post, the machines can end up being quite time and money intense, especially if you don’t work full time on them. Also, not everyone has got space for the machines at home.

However, if I produce plastic sheets in various thicknesses and sell them, this gives everybody the possibility to work with recycled materials. You can work on plastic sheets wih a lasercutter, cnc milling machine, or even simple tools, such as a drill, a woodsaw, etc.!

That’s why I want to construct a heatpress (see pictures)

the idea is to have two metal plates that are heatable – similar to the injection machine – that are pressed together with a spacer inbetween (called inlay on the drawings)

Have you got any tips, ideas etc. for this? (or URLs?) I want to keep this as low-budget as possible, I’m hoping to find most pieces on the junkyard.

– Is it possible to use an oven heating element?
– Can I weld it to the metal plates or do I have to mount it in a non-conducting way?
– If an oven heating element is possible, can I use the same electronics as the injection?
– How can I protect human beings from touching the heating elements? I don’t think I can just cover it with some insulation material. (Burning, melting, etc.)
What do you think?