Don’t rush to throw away your used plastic containers, because you can still find them useful application. In the new review, the author has collected the most interesting and practical examples of what else you can use unnecessary plastic bottles.

1. Decoration in a marine style

To create a unique decoration in a marine style, you will need a small plastic or glass bottle, which should be filled with plain water and attributes of the seabed: sand, shells, large pearl-like beads, coins, shiny beads and glass shards. When all the components of the composition are folded, drop a drop of blue food coloring into the bottle, a few drops vegetable oil and some glitter. All that remains is to tighten the cork well and the stunning decoration is ready.

2. Stand for books and magazines

Simple manipulations will allow you to turn an unnecessary milk or juice canister into a convenient stand for books, newspapers and magazines.

3. Faucet attachment

You can cut a convenient faucet attachment from a shampoo bottle, which will allow your child to outside help wash your hands or wash your face without getting all over the floor.

4. Napkin holder

A detergent bottle can be used to create a bright and practical napkin holder, the design of which is limited only by your imagination.

5. Stationery organizer

Instead of just throwing out regular bottles of shampoo and shower gel, make them into bright and cheerful coasters in the form of funny monsters. To begin, simply cut off the necks of the bottles and mark the locations of future cuts. You can cut out a variety of decorative elements, such as eyes, teeth and ears, from colored paper or fabric and attach them to the bottles using superglue. Finished goods It is best to attach it to the wall using double-sided tape.

6. Containers for cosmetic accessories

Cut up plastic bottles are perfect for creating adorable containers for storing makeup brushes, decorative cosmetics, ear sticks and other small items.

7. Poof

From a large number plastic containers you can make a charming pouf, the creation process of which is quite simple and straightforward. First you need to make a circle from plastic bottles of the same height and secure it with tape. The resulting structure must be well wrapped with a sheet of foamed polyethylene, securing all joints with tape. The base of the ottoman is ready, all that remains is to sew a suitable cover for it.

8. Bracelets

Plastic bottles are an excellent basis for creating original bracelets. Use fabric, thread, leather and any other materials to decorate the unsightly plastic base.

9. Stand for sweets

The bottoms of plastic bottles of different sizes, painted in the desired shade, can be used to create an impressive multi-level stand for convenient and beautiful storage of sweets.

10. Scoop and spatula

Plastic milk and juice canisters can be used to create a practical scoop and handy little spatula.

11. Protective cap

A simple cap, which can be made in no time from an ordinary plastic bottle, will help protect your phone from snow or rain.

12. Lamp

A small plastic canister can be a wonderful base for creating an original lamp.

13. Jewelry organizer

An amazing multi-level organizer that can be made from several bottoms of plastic bottles strung on a metal knitting needle.

14. Pots

Containers for storing spare parts.

Capacious containers made from unnecessary plastic canisters, which are perfect for storage, will help you clean up and maintain order in your garage. small parts, nails, screws and other small items.

17. Toy

Armed with scissors, felt-tip pens and paints, you can turn unnecessary plastic containers into fun toys, the creation process of which, as well as the result itself, will undoubtedly attract the attention of children.

Continuing the theme with your own hands.

When I go to a factory, I often have no idea what awaits me there. I had to visit the largest glass container production outside the Urals, and I imagined huge production areas.

Text and photo: Vadim Makhorov (original)

It often happens that when I go to a factory, I can’t even imagine what awaits me there. This time it was the same, I had to visit the largest glass container production outside the Urals, and I imagined huge production areas, but in reality everything turned out to be different.

We will talk about the Novosibirsk enterprise OJSC Ekran Plant. The history of the plant began after the Great Patriotic War- right then Soviet Union thought about creating a base for the production of electrovacuum devices for radar and television. In 1948, a decision was made to build the plant, and in 1954 it began its work as an electronics industry enterprise producing electro-optical devices, cathode ray tubes for oscillography and picture tubes for completing television factories. For decades, the plant regularly supplied its products to the needs of partner enterprises, but with the cessation of mass production of television equipment in Russia in 1994, it was repurposed to produce glass containers.

Glass line.

Today OJSC "Ekran Plant" is an enterprise that occupies a leading position among manufacturers of glass containers in the territory from the Urals to Far East. The plant's product range consists of flint glass bottles with a capacity of 0.25 liters to 1 liter for bottling alcoholic beverages, beer and carbonated drinks; jars for juices, sauces and other canned products with a capacity of 0.25 to 3 liters; brown glass bottles.

Glass furnace.

When I said the largest production of glass containers outside the Urals, I meant that the production capacity of the enterprise is 620 million pieces. glass bottles per year. If we divide by 365, we get about 1.7 million units. per day. Novosibirsk alone would have so many bottles; glass containers are in demand among enterprises in the Siberian and Far Eastern districts of the Russian Federation, as well as Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan.

But the largest production in this case is just two workshops (production of a colorless bottle and a brown one).

Bottles that are ready but have not yet passed quality control.

Glass container production technology consists of the following sequential processes:

• preparation of raw materials,
• preparation of the charge,
• glass melting,
• formation and annealing of products,
• quality control and packaging.

Preparation of feedstock is the purification of the feedstock components from undesirable impurities and their preparation for further processing and use. This is followed by the storage of individual types of raw materials and the supply of raw materials to receiving bins.

A charge is a dry mixture of materials that are fed into a furnace to produce glass melt. The main thing in the process of preparing a charge is weighing out the components in certain proportions and mixing them in order to obtain a homogeneous mass. The following raw materials are used to prepare the charge: quartz sand, dolomite flour, cullet, industrial chalk, alumina, soda ash, sodium sulfate, bleaches, dyes, etc.

Let's move on to the workshops of the new glass complex.

A glass furnace into which batch and cullet are fed. The productivity of such a furnace is about 180 tons of glass melt per day.

Melting glass melt is the most complex operation of all glass production, produced in bath furnaces continuous action, which are pools made of fire-resistant materials.

When the charge is heated to 1100 - 1150 °C, silicates are formed, first in solid form and then in the melt. With a further increase in temperature, the most refractory components completely dissolve in this melt - glass melt is formed. This glass mass is saturated with gas bubbles and is heterogeneous in composition. To clarify and homogenize the glass melt, its temperature is increased to 1500 - 1600 °C. In this case, the viscosity of the melt decreases, and, accordingly, it becomes easier to remove gas inclusions and obtain a homogeneous melt.

Glass melt leaving the furnace.

The color and transparency of the bottle is determined by the addition (or absence) of dyes and opacifiers to the mixture. Silencers (fluorine, phosphorus compounds, etc.) make glass opaque. Dyes include cobalt compounds ( blue), chromium (green), manganese (purple), iron (brown and blue-green tones), etc.

The process is quite smelly.

Glass melting is completed by cooling the glass mass to a temperature at which it acquires the viscosity required for the production of blown products.

Supply of glass melt to glass lines. At the bottom of the frame you can see two falling bright drops of glass melt - these are future bottles.

The process of creating droplets of glass melt.

The finished glass melt is supplied to molding machines, where the products are formed using the appropriate equipment.

Ten-section line producing brown glass bottles.

After going through the molding process, the product goes through additional heat treatment(annealing) in direct heating furnaces. Annealing is necessary to remove the internal residual stress in the glass container, which gives the product safety during further processing and operation. Temperature of products at the entrance to the annealing furnace: approximately 400 - 500 °C, and at the outlet: 50 - 80 °C.

Glass containers after annealing.

Spraying bottles with a special solution that prevents scratches and abrasions on bottles during transportation.

The product is ready, it just needs to pass quality control.

The glass complex is equipped with modern inspection machines that every second scan the parameters of each bottle to ensure it meets the buyer’s requirements.

Packaged products.

I showed the process of making bottles at the new glass complex. There is another workshop (where we started) where they make transparent bottles and jars, where quality control is done manually.

DECORATIVE BOTTLE FOR THE KITCHEN

Probably every housewife has wondered: how can she decorate the kitchen and bring a special zest/spice to the interior. For example, for the kitchen it is most important to decorate the shelves with original decorative bottles. The bottles are filled with all sorts of ingredients...more on that later...

Ingredients, indeed, can be very diverse: colored salt, bright vegetables and fruits, pasta, spices, coffee, even flowers.

Of course, such decorative bottles can be purchased in gift shops, but it is much more pleasant to make such a masterpiece with your own hands. Moreover, it will not take so much time and labor. And you will enjoy the creative process.

It’s not a shame to give such bottles as gifts and place them on the most prominent shelf in your kitchen.

Let's get started?

There are many options, in addition to the flowers and vegetables listed above, you can use grains, seeds and various cereals:

Millet, millet,

In addition, very beautiful decorative bottles are made from spices. To do this, you just need to go to the bazaar, pick up a little of everything from the spice merchant and at home, very carefully, pour them into jars in layers.

Decorative bottles with salt

Moreover, spices can be used either ground or not. And of course, if this is work from home and not a hobby, you will need quite a lot of spices. Therefore, do not hesitate to ask the seller for a discount.

Decorative bottle with salt

For creativity we will need:

For onI started to wash the bottle well, sterilize it (about 3-5 minutes), and dry it.

Next, prepare the bottle filler: scatter fine salt into containers, paint in different colors(i.e. the salt in each container will have its own specific color), leave the salt to dry. For about a day, do not forget to stir and break up any lumps.

Now, after the salt is prepared, let's get to the fun part. We add different colors of salt in the order you imagine. We recommend using a funnel when falling asleep.

Then we close it with a cork and decorate it with ribbons.

Decorative bottles bowls with vegetables and fruits

For such compositions, you will need everything the same as in the previous version, but instead of salt and gouache, various fruits/vegetables are used.

We also thoroughly wash, sterilize and dry the bottle.

We fill it with ingredients (as examples, we present you with photographs of finished decorative bottles). To keep everything neatly laid out, use knitting needles or chinese chopsticks for food.

We seal it with wax or sealing wax, a cork and get creative with the design of the bottle neck.

It is not bottles filled to the brim that look very elegant, but lonely herbal sprigs or hot chili peppers. They are filled with oil.

Flowers in bottles also look beautiful

The service life of such decorative creations is 2-3 years.

Be extremely careful if there are small children in the house. Place decorative bottles further and higher for safety reasons.

• Decorative bottles with cereals
• Corn - white, red, yellow,
• Rice - peeled, unpeeled, dark, long, round,
• Wheat - whole, shelled, dermat, semolina,
• Sorghum,
• Lentils,
• Peas - whole, halves,
• chickpeas,
• Buckwheat,
• Oats,
• Beans - red, white, brown, variegated, small and large,
• Seeds - pumpkin, sunflower, watermelon, melon.
  • Glass bottle, preferably some interesting, sophisticated shape.
  • Fine salt.
  • Gouache paints.
  • Brush or spatula.
  • Original stopper.
  • Ribbons.

Several recommendations for making decorative bottles with fruits and vegetables.

Everything can be canned. But jars of homemade ingredients are unlikely to be able to decorate your home, even if you try very hard to give them presentation. After all, food is food, and its place is in the pantry. What if you try to make canned food, the only purpose of which is to add comfort to your kitchen, and maybe even your living room?

Look for dishes, or 4 rules for rolling

Rule number 1. Not everyone can roll up for beauty. food product. Excluded: cucumbers, tomatoes, zucchini, sweet peppers.
What can and should be “rolled up”? For example, flowers. Yes, yes, flowers, including roses, left over from holiday bouquets! Small multi-colored hot peppers, small mushrooms, tinted garlic, beans, tiny unripe carrots, heavenly apples, oranges, lemons, and radishes also look very beautiful.

Rule number 2. You should not use vinegar as a preservative. It changes the color of the raw material, it seems to burn out, it becomes yellowish or greenish, in general, it looks somehow boring. Try to get medical formaldehyde. The perfect thing! Vegetables and fruits will remain bright, juicy, and the jars will never explode. The main thing is not to heat the solution and work with it in a respirator and rubber gloves. Instead of formalin, 70 percent ethyl alcohol is quite suitable, but over time your canned food may fade.

Another option is a strong solution of gelatin with sugar, about 1/1, but it can only be used for fruits and flowers; vegetables look bad in such a solution.

Rule number 3: Don't use regular glass jars. You are not going to open and eat your creations later. Get the original container! Every little thing like garlic or mushrooms can be carefully placed through the neck into a beautiful transparent glass bottle. Find fancy chemical flasks - great! They look unusual and immediately attract attention. Low, thick-walled honey jars with a pneumatic cork lid are suitable for sliced ​​oranges and lemons (honey in such containers is often sold in large supermarkets). In general, look for dishes! The more original it is in itself, the more interesting your canned food will look.

Rule number 4. You do not need special tightness, but, nevertheless, it is worth preparing a lot of colored wax or paraffin in advance in order to fill the cork or lid with it. This will hide any imperfections (for example, the fact that the lid looks cheap) and give the blanks a noble, antique look.

Layer by layer
We place the required raw materials into cleanly washed and dried containers. It can be uniform or in layers, but not mixed. It looks beautiful if you alternate a layer of, for example, lemon slices with a layer of rose petals or garlic.

When placing in the final container, try not to leave any free space; your “blanks” should not float in the jar. If you are using formaldehyde, pour each layer separately. In other cases, you can proceed as with normal canning. Flowers, on the contrary, cannot be placed tightly; they should hang, as it were, inside the vessel. Some experts recommend a very strong saline solution for them, but this is quite risky.

After pouring, close the lid and carefully, heating the wax in a tablespoon, pour it. There is no need to be afraid of picturesque flows; they will only decorate the product. After finishing work, the jar should stand in a cool, dark place for at least a week.

And now the most important thing: where to put your decorative canned food? Counter question: why is it necessary to ask? You can do it differently. Buy more metal “clamps” for water pipes at the hardware store that match the diameter of your dishes. The “collar” is carefully wrapped in parchment or a piece of burlap, tightened tightly onto the neck of the jar or bottle and secured to the wall with a screw. True, if the vessel is very potbellied, it is better to place it on a shelf or cabinet, since hanging it will look bad. The ideal thing is flat cognac bottles, you can hang them on any wall!

If you did everything right, your canned goods will last you indefinitely. You can’t eat them, but even in severe winter they will remind you of summer and make your home warm and cozy.

Ekaterina Postnikova

Well, who among us doesn’t like to drink? Well, at least if he doesn’t love you, then you have to from time to time. Sometimes after fun get-togethers with friends or family celebrations, there are a lot of bottles of wine or other “fun” drinks left behind. The first thing that comes to mind is to throw it in the trash. But don't rush! You will be surprised, but empty bottles of the same wine can be much more useful than you think. Take a look at these ideas for using empty bottles around the house - you might discover a ton of useful little things and be able to create one of these practical works of art yourself.

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Place one of these special terracotta things on the neck of the bottle and voila! Your plants will water themselves.

2. Bookshelf.

Sturdy boards + bottles = DIY bookhouse.

3. Candlesticks.

The long neck of the bottle will prevent the candle from going out, and the glass will protect from the wind.

4. Torches.

Fill these unique torches with citronella oil and stop mosquitoes from invading your property.

5. Hanging flowerbed.

It feels like the bottles grew from plants, and not the other way around.

6. Terrarium.

Clear or colored glass bottles are ideal for growing your own tiny garden.

Add some color and flair to your garden while still maintaining your personal space. This idea will work at home too.

8. Hummingbird feeder.

Tiny pollinators will love this awesome and eco-friendly feeder.

9. Chaise longue.

Looks cool, but is it comfortable?

10. Wind chime.

This distinctive cork wine bottle is ready to take on the wind.

11. Chandelier.

A luxurious detail that would suit even a ballroom interior.

12. Hat rack.

The idea was presented by Lucirmás in Milan. Partly an art, but at the same time a useful thing.

13. Necklace.

Handmade in the USA. A similar necklace can be made to suit your own color taste.

14. Glassware.

Wine bottles are the most durable due to annealing, which means they are ideal for making glassware.

15. LED lamp.

Are you looking for a unique lamp? affordable price? Simply insert the LED plug into wine bottle and voila!

16. Serving dish.

An affordable way to serve appetizers at your next party.

17. Bottle tree.

It is known to everyone and is used as packaging for a wide variety of products: water, juices, soft drinks. What is a plastic bottle made of? Such packaging plays an omnipresent role in our lives as consumers. As our awareness of environmental issues that surround plastic, many became interested life cycle of this material, from production to subsequent disposal to landfill or recycling. Awareness of this process can make consumers think more about how they use and manage their waste.

Composition, main properties

What is a plastic bottle made of? It all starts with obtaining raw materials - oil production, which comes from distant fields. After receiving it for further processing, everything is loaded into containers, onto tankers and sent to factories. What is a plastic bottle made of? Petroleum. When heating and mixing hydrocarbons with chemical catalysts, which causes polymerization, resulting in plastic. In addition, various components are released from it during processing. Next it receives gas, fuel oil and other products. What are plastic bottles made of? Most are made from polyethylene terephthalate (PET, also known as plastic). One of the important chemical parameters is viscosity, which is determined by the size of the polymer molecules. What are plastic bottles made of, and how are they made from this material? Polyethylene terephlate is widely used in Russia for the production different types blanks, so-called “preforms”. Then, after heating, various types of shapes are made (blown) from them, primarily plastic bottles.

what else can replace it? Not everyone knows that some manufacturers, caring about the environment, use bioplastics from plant materials (Bioplastics). To do this, they are first processed to form polymers. This is followed by a transformation process, resulting in new material bioplastic. It is believed that this is better for environment, since it does not require the extraction and processing of oil. However, such a replacement from plant materials quickly decomposes and is not stored for a long time. In addition, in cases of long exposure, bottles made of such material can become deformed and leak. There is also an opinion that the situation with bioplastics also cannot be avoided. Its production requires large areas agricultural land for growing grain crops. In addition, they consume large number water, fuel and other resources.

Fight against garbage

The production and consumption of plastic containers is constantly increasing around the world. As a result, waste is stored that does not decompose. At the same time, plastic bottles are a very common form of waste around the world. However, when thrown away, not all of them end up in landfills. The world's oceans are filled with so much trash that it poses a serious threat to many marine organisms. Instead of breaking down completely, plastic actually breaks down into very small segments that can be consumed by ocean creatures. The small town of Concord is the first locality in the USA, where a ban on the sale of water in plastic bottles has been introduced.