Styro-Fail (Recycled Styrene Recording Blanks?)

[Kat]

Beyond the lathe cutting hobby I have a business where I make drink coasters and other things out of recycled plastic, so naturally I would try making recycled polystyrene record blanks.

I had this whole idea of bringing back record postcards like recordio discs and voice-o-graphs in the form of what I’m calling Styro-Phones and ignored the fact that I am....

A. Using a Gakken EZ Record Maker which is a step down from a recordio

and B. Recycled plastic likes to not be smooth, especially if you press it by hand and it doesn’t melt all the way through.

After much experimenting I found out what I thought were the right settings that allowed a disc to be loud and trackable on turntables but.... turns out every disc has its own ideal settings and I decided it was no longer worth my time and am postponing the project for now. Just thought I’d show it off though!

Here’s a video and some photos: https://www.instagram.com/p/CJsHV1FBaH6/

[piaptk]

You didn’t fail. You just discovered yet another way to waste time and money in the record cutting game without having anything but a little fun to show for it. You can just throw it on top of my enormous stack of the same.

Looks cool though!

[Kat]

You didn’t fail. You just discovered yet another way to waste time and money in the record cutting game without having anything but a little fun to show for it. You can just throw it on top of my enormous stack of the same.

Looks cool though!

Thanks!

Thought I’d provide a little update on these. I had shelved them because of two issues, untrackable grooves and potholes. I figured out that the grooves were easy enough to make deeper with more weight, but the potholes prevent the discs from being all that consistent. I am now in the process of figuring out how to avoid pits with either a press, smaller plastic flakes, or both.

Here’s a recent one I made with a classic audiodisc inspired look. Yes I did record the swearing-in live.

9F317226-C3B8-4CF0-BD9B-C48DA3396791.jpeg

[tragwag]

sweet!

[Kat]

sweet!

hey, thanks!

[jjwharris]

I would love to hear a sample of Biden swearing!

I've got a friend who works with recycled plastic and he's very keen to give it a try. It looks like so much work though!

[Nickelmax]

Can you tell me a little bit about your process?
So you took Recycled Polystyrene From packaging, i guess? Not those from construction sites?

How did you melt the the recycled material?

What did you used as negativ(=father) (Or did you just directly cut your audio info on it) ?

Nice idea anyway ! Really like the recycled postcard idea!!
Cheers Nickelmax

[Kat]

I would love to hear a sample of Biden swearing!

I've got a friend who works with recycled plastic and he's very keen to give it a try. It looks like so much work though!

It’s definitely a learning curve that’s for sure! I’m going to be building an injection machine from some open source plans that I think will provide the necessary pressure to get these records working.

Here’s Biden swearing! (on a bible) Basically me playing recordio without actually having one. Sounds about the same too. But Hail to the Chief comes through nicely in a vintage sort of way.

IMG_6025.MP4

[Kat]

Can you tell me a little bit about your process?
So you took Recycled Polystyrene From packaging, i guess? Not those from construction sites?

How did you melt the the recycled material?

What did you used as negativ(=father) (Or did you just directly cut your audio info on it) ?

Nice idea anyway ! Really like the recycled postcard idea!!
Cheers Nickelmax

Thank you! and sure! I got photos.

So I take retail spools, grind them up and then press them into a disc by hand using a pipe and a laboratory hotplate. Then I sand it down and drill a hole and hope for the best. If there’s a decent amount of recording space I throw it on the Gakken and again... hope for the best.

So it’s pressing a blank disc for cutting.

A60BC274-9B2B-4868-AB0E-61D533AF475C.jpeg

attachment=4]11C2734A-6406-4034-BCFB-705E9A2767F8.jpeg[/attachment]

3FE8CD97-4F2B-4A3B-AAAE-F718E1E11FEF.jpeg

349B00E4-B7A9-436F-A387-5E2B836998D6.jpeg

[Kat]

Another update here. I recently won a couple grants for this business. Sometime this summer to early fall, I am going to have the equipment to actually press these. Not an old stock record press sadly but a Precious Plastic injection molder that will hopefully eliminate any human error from pressing blanks by hand.

I’m hoping to upgrade from just four inch discs to 5” and 7” and have a working Wilcox-Gay Recordio instead of the Gakken Ez Record Maker. (I’m confident it will work as this is the same material as Picnic Plates and the Gakken is essentially a shrunk down Recordio)

I do have a question I suppose, could I possibly cut this sort of plastic on a Presto eventually?

[Nickelmax]

I am really sorry that i can not help you with your question since i dont cut masters or anything. Hope to get there at some point.

The extruder seems to be a really good idea, since you can recycle a lot of different plastics with that.
A very good tipp, grind your material smaller, smaller, smaller...
There are hardly any (visible) surface irregularities if the raw material can be molten evenly. For best results i would recommend a perfect and even Metal mold, in which the styrofoam is extruded into.

Cheers

[Kat]

The extruder seems to be a really good idea, since you can recycle a lot of different plastics with that.
A very good tipp, grind your material smaller, smaller, smaller...
There are hardly any (visible) surface irregularities if the raw material can be molten evenly. For best results i would recommend a perfect and even Metal mold, in which the styrofoam is extruded into.

Cheers

Good idea! I can get the pieces small but they could probably be even smaller.

As for the increased heat and pressure I am operating under the assumption that will be fixed shortly with the injector, the plastic will get heated evenly and I’ll be able to apply three times my body weight over one second instead of one quarter to one half sporadically over twelve minutes.

E241C1B9-6B2D-47B9-8797-5F1178335ADE.png

[Kat]

Getting closer to testing this crazy idea out with higher pressure. In addition to making a bunch of useful knickknacks with this open source injection press, I am also going to try and make 5” (Gakken-style) and 7” (45 adapter not included) blanks. Hoping for some good results.

29CCC839-BB4C-411A-9337-797650D0917D.jpeg

C24FCFAD-6AE0-430A-B6F6-AEB50148AB80.jpeg

While I’m obviously going to phased this out soon, I did manage to hand press a 4” disc with 20 grams of plastic instead of the usual 30 and it seems to be somewhat less bubbly.

020A3EE4-C0E4-4C39-B59F-3B2E26784A33.jpeg

[Kat]

So the Precious Plastic injection molder is done and I am already making fun things with it.

AEE3550A-47F7-460D-B113-C8D6EDCADCB8.jpeg

9224A401-951F-4441-B906-C749F7258115.jpeg

Meanwhile I found a very interesting patent from 1949 that someone graciously linked on the wikipedia page for Polystyrene. That is so oddly specific. They deserve a hug.

US2681323.pdf

The patent was from Union Carbide and essentially you have to mix melted polystyrene with a ~4% of essentially any natural wax and around 300~ish degrees to increase the wear resistance of a record.

Now this is applicable to pressed records and not blanks but it does raise a few interesting questions.

- Which postconsumer plastics most resemble these historical compositions?
- Could an industry quality blank record be made with entirely post consumer materials and natural resources?
- How do I obtain a banbury mixer without breaking the bank. Do I even need one?
- Even a modern made in china Crosley stylus has a far smaller tracking force than any needle of the day so could this even be be overkill?
- What additives exactly are in the Gakken records?

These experiments would be worth repeating in a modern day setting.

[Kat]

Just passed another hurdle! Successfully injection molded a few blanks at five inches instead of the four, a step closer to the eventual goal of seven.

It would seem that the full melting and internal mixing gives a far more uniform disc than I could ever do by hand. There’s still potholes but they come from flow lines rather than air pockets and can be sanded away much easier. I’m going to apply as many grits of sandpaper as my sanity allows it to achieve a lacquer like finish, then test these things out on the ol’ Gakken

1F837903-D1C5-4BBE-8D09-C3552B91F6C6.jpeg

182DED84-6737-4B02-A92E-4936C99EDCA4.jpeg

[Kat]

Unfortunately it has proven near impossible to get consistent results out of the Gakken and injection molding. While disappointing, I’m still proud of trying.

I’m instead going to try it out with other polymers instead, like polyethylene and polypropylene. I have a potential source of polyethylene glycol PETG from 3D print scraps too.

However I’m going to wait until I have a real lathe or recruit someone else for testing. In the meantime, I’m going to be attempting to build a custom arm for a General Industries turntable.

[markrob]

Hi,
I wonder if the Emroy Cook method of record pressing would work here. In that mode, you don't injection mold. Instead, you distribute fine ground plastic across a book style mold and then apply much lower pressure along with heat to reflow the plastic in place. Search here for more info.

Mark

[Kat]

Hi,
I wonder if the Emroy Cook method of record pressing would work here. In that mode, you don't injection mold. Instead, you distribute fine ground plastic across a book style mold and then apply much lower pressure along with heat to reflow the plastic in place. Search here for more info.

Mark

Very interesting, thanks! Just took a look at the patent! In fact that vaguely resembles the open pipe hand pressing method that I started out with. I’ll definitely look into what it would involve to make one of these.

Looks like it would work best if I can get the plastic into a bouncy consistency similar to sawdust.

[markrob]

Hi,

I used a coffee grinder to grind up some craft store beads back when I did my testing. You don't need much pressure since you don't have to move the plastic.

[Kat]

Hi,

I used a coffee grinder to grind up some craft store beads back when I did my testing. You don't need much pressure since you don't have to move the plastic.

Alright! Per your original post, looks like you used polystyrene too.

I’ve found I could potentially do this for cheap with a T-shirt press which has the desired temperature and pressure, and three metal plates including one with a circle. I could also move onto a more sophisticated system later with a press and heated plates and maybe a custom CNC’d mold if I’m feeling spendy.