Recycled Plastic handle scales?

[JakeMakes]

Recently ran across a tutorial about how to recycled plastic bottles and such into blocks that can be used for other purposes. I was wondering if anyone had ever done this for a knife handle. Sounds kind of cool. With the right colors you could get some pretty nice patterns. Any info?

 

[Park Swan]

Are you talking about the HDPE mallet video? I would think that HDPE or other plastic bottle materials would be undesirably slick for a knife handle.

 

[JakeMakes]

Are you talking about the HDPE mallet video? I would think that HDPE or other plastic bottle materials would be undesirably slick for a knife handle.

I think it was related to that video, or one similar. Would it really be much slicker that a highly polished wood or micarta handle?

 

[Park Swan]

Texture would be a big factor. Raw wood that's polished at a high grit is still wood, but if it's coated then it depends on what it's coated with. Stabilized woods that are resin impregnated, or epoxy in general isn't as slippery as I'd expect HDPE to be. I really can't say for sure, but I do appreciate the idea of recycling bottles into knife handles. I say give it a shot!

 

[S.Alexander]

I haven't seen this video you speak of. However, most plastics don't react well to heat. They could deform and melt while grinding, or possibly even while the knife sits in the sun.

If you want to recycle materials, then I would look at wood products, or micarta products.

Come to think of if, the user named Shadetree on this site, will make resin impregnated handles out of MANY recycled materials. Look them up.