Bicycle panniers – mine have a really useful stretchy mesh pocket on the outside, unfortunately now more hole than mesh. Any ideas on repairing them? The actual pannier part is absolutely fine.

The summer before last, I bought some mens’ shorts for myself and since I don’t have things down there in need of containment, I removed the “netting” layer – that wouldn’t have been pretty but would have fit the bill perfectly – stretchy white mesh. (I ended up using it in the greenhouse to store bulbs.) Can anyone think of anything else in the same vein to reuse instead? Heavy (so they won’t run) nylon tights maybe?

Another idea which is less reusing/recycling but still repairing: could you crochet a flat mesh from a plastic twine using a variant on a string bag patten? I used to make a version of this bag from all sorts of different yarns when we were short of shopping bags – makes up very quickly because it’s so much hole :)

Any other ideas?

(Photo by arifm)

I’ve always put my horse’s tail and mane clippings on the his manure heap to compost down but I recently wondered if I could use them for something else instead. I’ve heard of horse hair mattresses but don’t think I have enough for that!

According to Wikipedia, horsehair is/has been used “for various purposes, including upholstery, [artists & shaving] brushes, the bows of musical instruments, a hard-wearing fabric called haircloth, and for horsehair plaster, a wallcovering material formerly used in the construction industry and now found only in older buildings. .. [It is also used in] the crafts of horsehair hitching, horsehair braiding, pottery, and in making jewellery items such as bracelets, necklaces, earrings and [hair clips].” I think the latter group is more appropriate to reuses at home – but the former group might provide inspiration on where you could pass it on — for example, if you had a stables and generated a lot of horsehair, a local old-fashioned upholsterer might be interested in it.

You can compost it of course (as Bea has been doing) and some people use it (along with human hair clippings and anything similarly bit-ty) to discourage slugs from delicate.

Any other ideas?

Thought of another recycle that I could use some help with!

I’ve taken some waterproof trousers, jackets and cycling gear from someone who didn’t want to just dump them in landfill. I thought there would be
loads of things I could make with them – my ideas so far are a pair of rainlegs, a pair of gaiters made from the bottom of some waterproof trousers, a rucksack cover like this, a waterproof bike saddle cover and maybe a waterproof hat.

Can anyone come up with any more ideas? And does anyone know how I can seal the seams for things which need to be really watertight?

I think we’ve talked about the watertight seam question before – but if anyone has any new suggestions, please do feel free to add them.

As for things to make out of them, if I still used my bike, I’d probably want a waterproof hat/helmet cover – with a peak at the front to protect my glasses a bit. I also like the idea of gaiters as my trousers always puddle-soak.

As it is though, I rarely have to leave the house in the rain so if the waterproofs were made from a neoprene type material, I’d probably use some of it, along with a bit of expanded polystyrene foam, to make a bath pillow – much more my speed now ;)

Other ideas?

When we pulled it out, we found why it was under there – the plastic runners had snapped off and there were just holes the length of the sledge in their place. Cue two disappointed faces. We left it where it was because we were on the outward swing of our walk and forgot to pick it up on the way back – but we might go pick it up again if we can thing of a good reuse for it.

The plastic looked too thin/brittle to warrant a repair job to be reused as a sledge but that doesn’t mean it has to head for landfill.

The first reuse idea that springs to mind is the ubiquitous planter – I can always use new planters. The holes were only about 1cm across – some crocks or a bit of liner would stop the soil falling out but provide adequate drainage – but I’d be a little cautious about growing food in there because it’s unlikely to be decent quality plastic and may leach all sorts of stuff into the soil.

What else could I do with it instead?

Anyone have good craft ideas for a synthetic England Flag? There may be lots of them on the streets or landfills soon

There certainly will be! A4-ish size car ones, towel sized ones, super-sized ones… a whole lot of squeaky synthetic white fabric with a red cross on it — all of which will be instantly discarded as soon as the team are knocked out. (I’m speaking from experience about the disappearing – the photo was taken on our old estate by John during the last World Cup and they all disappeared the day after the losing match.)

Of course it would be great if everyone reduced – didn’t buy as many (if any) or kept them to reuse for future events rather than buying new each time but that doesn’t seem to happen.

So any reusing, upcycling and recycling suggestions?

Can I recycle a torn rubber flipper (the kind used for snorkelling)? I know you can get recycled rubber products.

Rubber recycling is quite common – car tyres being the most common thing collected and reused – but while I’ve seen bins for tyres at our local tip, our local tip guys seem pretty strict that it’s tyres only.

Does anyone know of any recycling companies that take rubber from individuals or anywhere it’s collected for recycling?

And what about reuses?

Our kids’ trampoline has gone rusty so is unsafe for them to use. We can give the metal legs to scrap but what can we do with the mat?

According to Wikipedia, the mats are usually made from canvas or woven Polypropylene. The latter is recyclable – it’s number 5 plastic – so is in theory recyclable wherever number 5 plastic is collected.

As for reuses, a waterproof mat is always handy in the garden – it could be used as a picnic mat or a groundsheet under a tent. Depending on how tight the weave is, it also might be suitable as a dust sheet to protect floors while painting or the like.

Any other suggestions?

(Photo by kermer)

I’ve always poo-poohed the idea because we have cats who like to stretch up against furniture then dig in their very long, very sharp claws – not exactly compatible with inflatable furniture – but a friend told us his cat did that too and it wasn’t a problem because the PVC plastic is so thick. Then suddenly, mysterious, he found himself sitting considerably lower in the chair thanks to a claw-sized slow puncture. Claws one, inflatable thing nil.

So we won’t be getting on now but what are the options for reusing an old exercise ball? A single puncture or two could probably be repaired with a bicycle puncture repair kit but if the problem is more systemic, it might not be worth repair – so what else can be done with it?

I suspect with a bit of handiwork, they could still be used as seats – filled with beanbag balls instead of air – but I wonder if the sliced up “skin” could be used for anything else too…

For safety reasons, they have to be replaced regularly – I read someone suggest they are replaced when the outer layer gets to a level of fuzziness comparable to a wool blanket or if they’ve sustained a fall – but that doesn’t mean they can’t still be used for other non-life-risking purposes.

Because they’re a thin but strong, lightweight rope, they’ll be great for a huge number of practical purposes around the home and garden – supporting tree branches, tying down roof racks, generally tying, um, things to other things…

But can they actually be recycled? They’re usually polyamide/nylon but are there any particular places that collect them for recycling?

And has anyone made any fun things with them? I wonder if they could be coiled up to make a fun basket or something… Any ideas?

I have been given a shed full of random stuff to make crafts out of. Most of it I’ve managed to use but I can’t find any use for these skateboard wheels. What can I make with skateboard wheels?

If they’re still in pretty clean (whether bashed up or not), I imagine they could be made into a very cool coat rack – or even doorknobs – ideal for a skater’s bedroom. (They might need to be glued into position if the spinning around causing slippage problems.)

If they’re still on an axle and/or easily attachable to a board, they could be used to make a trolley for moving heavy plant pots around the garden.

Any other suggestions?

Can you recycle swim caps?

It’ll depend on what the caps are made from but the answer to actual recycling is probably no. According to Wikipedia, they can be made from latex, silicone or lycra: silicone is recyclable, but not collected widely for recycling while latex and lycra (spandex) aren’t recyclable on a large scale yet.

If they’re still in good, usable condition, the best thing to do would be able pass them on to someone else who can use them for their original purpose – through a charity/thrift shop maybe, or through your local pool.

And what about reuses?

(Photo by coudron)

Like children’s car seats, hardshell bike helmets have to be retired after a bump in case they’ve been damaged structurally and so might not be as protective at the critical moment.

Like hard hats, I bet they’d made fun hanging baskets – or even used for something like growing tomatoes upside down.

Any other suggestions?

Other bike related Recycle This queries

• How can I reuse or recycle a bike saddle?
• How can I reuse or recycle a bicycle inner tubes?
• How can I reuse or recycle a crooked bicycle wheel?

(Photo by charlotel)

where or how to you recycle old bowling balls? They are petrol based. estimates of at least 100,000 are just put in land fills. thanks

Ooh, good question.

If they’re still in good condition, I’d offer them on Freecycle or to the local bowling alley – if they can’t use them because all theirs need to be a particular brand or whatever, they might know a customer who could use them.

If they’re cracked or what not, I’d still be tempted to offer them on Freecycle – for people wanting them for a fun decoration (a GIANT paperweight perhaps ;) ) or for a craft project.

Actual recycling will depend on exactly what type of plastic it is, for example, some balls are made out of urethane and that is cost-prohibitive to recycle – so it’ll probably be easier to think of good reuses than get the plastic back into the system.

So reuse suggestions?

(Photo by bas3ssen)

i would like to suggest : pointe shoes.
i have ten trillion old ones and they’re just hanging around

We’ve already covered shoes in general, Crocs and high-heeled shoes – so there maybe some suggests that’ll apply to these shoes too.

Flannery’s “ten trillion” of them suggests they’ve been worn as much as they can/should be so giving them to, say, beginners or other dancers might not be an option. I suspect like with high-heels and other “pretty” shoes though, they might lend themselves to crafts, especially if they’re “shabby chic” slightly scruffy rather than completely trashed. A display like the one in the picture might be a wonderful decoration for a dancer, former dancer or ballet-fan’s house.

Any particular suggestions or other ideas?

(Photo by crisderaud)

Any idea what to do with old karate belts? They are around 2m long, very strong and in all different colours. Thanks for any suggestions.

Using them as straps for homemade casual bags springs instantly to mind – but probably only because I was looking for something to serve that purpose last night.

Any other ideas?

(Photo by Sucker)

Any ideas on how to recycle squash balls? I play squash 4-5 times a week so end up with loads that are past their best. I’m sure there must be something better I can do than just throw them away? Suggestions I’ve had were to use them in the washing machine (?), in the cistern to save water, cover them in glitter to make xmas decs or make my own lottery / bingo set ….

I think the washing machine thing is like part of the idea behind washing balls (Ecoballs etc) – they bang against the clothes and the friction helps remove the grim and dirt, or something. That’s an awful explanation – sorry. Can anyone explain it better?

The lottery/bingo idea may seem a bit of a joke but if a local school fair or church fete may be able to use a whole stack of them for just that purpose – so it may be worth offering on your local Freecycle group just in case.

Any other suggestions? Am I right in thinking they’re made from rubber – and if so, what are the recycling options? Anyone know?

(Photo by wizard)

I live in Southport and the Open Golf Championship here the other week made everyone golf crazy. I walk my dog on the beach and every day since then she’s brought me golf balls that she’s found on the sands. I don’t play so I don’t know what to do with them but I don’t just want to leave them on the beach to get washed away. Any ideas?

First things first, let me wave excitedly at you, Vicky and request that you give my fondest regards to my hometown. I lived in Southport for the first 18 years of my life – my mum and dad still live there – and remember two Opens (I worked at the last one in 1998; watched, utterly bored, at the one before that in 1991) so know what an impact it makes on the town.

As for the golf ball situation, I guess the most obvious solution is pass them along to someone who will use them – but after time on the beach/in a dog’s mouth, they might not be pristine enough for Royal Birkdale.

Any other ideas?

(Photo by myles)

Because of the wonders of wireless, I am currently sat our (still not paved) garden enjoying the fact it’s not raining for once and watching with bemusement as our neighbour Jason tries out his new homemade canoe trailer for his bike.

I’ve mentioned Jason’s love of creatively building trailers before but the difference this time is that he’s fixed up the canoe too. He has a habit of acquiring random things in a broken state and either fixing them (as he did with the canoe – although he’s yet to water test it – that’s why he built the trailer, to take it down to the river) or cannibalising them for bits. The previously cracked (fibreglass?) canoe has been fixed, the trailer built from salvaged planks and pram wheels.

But if he hadn’t fixed the canoe, what else could he have done with it?

I guess it could be used as a fun, feature pot for the garden – but a very big one that – if mostly covered like this one – doesn’t offer much room for the plants to surface. Any other suggestions?

(Photo by gundolf)

hello, any ideas on what i could make with a broken basketball?

it looks exactly like this (–>)

and is completely intact apart from the bit where the pump goes in..

We had an old deflated football in our garden for a while (no idea where it came from) and one of the cats, Carbon, decided it was his own private rainwater collector/bowl — but that was an unintended, temporarily reuse.

So has anyone got any better ideas for Ewan?

(Photo by lusi)

i got a nice new soft bike saddle to replace my old hard one so i can cycle in comfort. but i was trying to think of what i could do with the old one.

any ideas? i’d love to turn it into something funky and cool or useful.

I have a feeling I’ve seen some cool bike seat repurposing but can’t think where or what it was (although a lamp springs to mind for some crazy reason).

Ideas?

(Oh, and recycling cyclists may also be interested in our posts on wonky wheels rims and inner tubes.)

(Photo by cribbe)

I was wondering if there were any ideas about old bike tubes….

I’m presuming we’re talking inner tubes anyway – it’s quite possible there is another type of bike tube since I’m not a terribly keen cyclist – I live at the top of a steep hill and prefer to tackle it on foot. If there is some other ‘bike tube’, please feel free to answer about both ;)

(Photo by kikashi)

I got an email from one Bradley Boericke with the subject “wetsuit” but without any explanation text (or text at all) in the message itself.

But whether it’s a genuine question or a really, really obscure way to sell me penis enlargement pills, it’s a good question: how can they be re-used or recycled?

I suspect, like swimsuits, they have a tendency to degrade at key pressure spots and in order to keep those key pressure spots covered up (since they’re usually the bits that people like to have covered up), you have to replace the whole suit even though the vast majority of it is still in a good condition.

So ideas? And also any suggestions for lengthening their lifespan?

(Photo by simmo333)

I found your site from Google after getting fed up with old snowboarding gear I have that has no snowboarding use left but could be used for other things. Searching your site I found a use for old plastic bindings, that someone said they could use for a project.

How can I reuse 2 old snowboards (one from 2000, the other 1995?) and one set of aluminium bindings? I am not after anything for them but feel they could be put to alternative uses.

I’m presuming they’re not still usable as snowboards by anyone else for whatever reason – otherwise I’m sure Mark would just pass them onto someone else who could use them (either through something like Freecycle or a snowboard-specific forum or whatever) – and Wikipedia informs me they’re usually made from a combination of wood, fibreglass, plastic and metal so recycling them is probably a nightmare – so we’re looking for reuse suggestions.

I think they’d make a cool version of the traditional cheap breeze-block-and-a-plank shelving unit but I realise that might not fit everyone’s favoured design aesthetic.

So any other ideas?

(Photo by bartgroe)

The pool is pretty much constantly used to for children’s swimming lessons so they must go through loads of them as they get beaten up and (I guess) start to deteriorate because they’re constantly ducked in chlorine-y water.

The floats are either small, flat boards (about 30cm/12inches square) or long, thin cylinders of foam like giant haircurlers.

I think about asking to take them but worry they’re just end up cluttering up my cellar unless I can think of good ways to reuse them. So any suggestions?

(And yes, I will be using the save-the-swimsuit and reuse suggestions for my old swimming costumes. ;) )

(Oh, and apologies to anyone reading the site through an RSS reader who saw a bunch of spam links at the bottom of a post the other day – we got slightly hacked… We’ve looked into it and hopefully it won’t happen again – but if it does, please let us know — thanks to Helen for the heads-up this time)

I had a bit of a ding on my bike the other day, nothing serious but the front wheel ended up a bit crooked. I’m going to change it at the weekend but don’t know what to do with the slightly bent one. Ideas?

You could see if a bike recycling group (like re-cycle) could fix it – or if they work with youth groups, use it as a teaching aid.

Aside from that, train ivy/honeysuckle or something up it in the garden to make a themed feature?

Any other ideas?

(Photo by przybysz)

As my knowledge of snowboarding on extends as far as playing ‘SSX’ on the XBox, my first question was “what are snowboard bindings?”. Wikipedia informs me they are the bits that hold the snowboarder’s feet to the board and can either be as simple as straps or complex moulded hard plastic things. (Someone please correct me if I’ve read/written that wrong.)

So any suggestions?

(Photo by aculine)

I go swimming at my gym everyday and even though I rinse them straight afterwards, my swimsuits always begin to thin after a couple of months. I usually go for cheap costumes but have had the same experience with more expensive ones.

I was wondering if you or any of your readers knew any secret ways to make them last longer or ways I can use the fabric elsewhere? It’s usually the bit stretched across my chest or the seams on the straps that goes first – the rest is fine. Thanks!

(Photo by dinny)

I’m really interested in how one would recycle a yoga mat? One of the old school, pvc based ones, not the eco friendly one (which I have now).

If Paul means the type of mat I think he means, they’re a long thin piece of foam, about 6ft long and 2ft wide (185cm by 66cm ish) and about half an inch (1cm) thick. Depending on the requirements and the thickness/flexibility of the foam, they can either be rolled up like a camping bedroll or are left flat (the ones at my uni gym were like that).

So any suggestions for reuses? Or are there any recycling options if somewhere (like a gym) was getting rid of them in bulk?

Paul doesn’t say what condition his yoga mat is in – some of the ones at the uni were bashed to smeg at the sides and going thin where they’d been doubled up – so re-use suggestions for falling apart ones would be good too, just in case.

(Photo by bharat – I couldn’t find a picture without a ball in it too, so just imagine that’s not there :) )

I hate throwing away old furniture, but sometimes there’s nothing left to do but mulch that old wood and move on. That’s fine except now I have the slate top to an old pool table (so its about 4′x8′x1″) and I’m trying to figure out what I can do with it.

I’m a handy-man, so no idea is too crazy. I have thought about building a new base for the pool table, but I don’t really have a rec room big enough to use it. And I _really_ don’t need a 500 lb. chalk board.

If it’s in a good condition, I guess you could use it as dining table top – but only if such a heavy and striking feature would work in your house.

The other idea that springs to mind is Freecycle in case anyone else in Scott’s area could use it as a pool table or whatever – but it sounds like he’d like to use it himself – so any suggestions? Remember crazy isn’t an issue : )

(Photo by cmx82)

How can I recycle … Coleman, JetBoil, and other nonrefillable fuel canisters? Thanks!

I had no idea what they were but thanks to Google, I now think he means camping gas/fuel canisters (is that right, Russ? if not, please correct me!)

I have a feeling this will be a recycle rather than reuse item but any suggestions for either are welcome.

(Photo by 2sogar)