We repair and make new tool handles from PET bottles

Everyone has an old, fully functional tool with broken or damaged handles. Most of these problems can be solved with several layers of electrical tape, but this is done more reliably with PET tape cut from plastic bottles.

What you will need:

PET tape;
construction hair dryer;
knife.

The process of repairing tool handles with PET tape

To repair handles, it is necessary to cut plastic bottles into strips 6-12 mm wide. The method involves heat shrinking them, so it is better to use thin-walled bottles. These are usually used for bottling beer. For highly carbonated drinks, stiffer bottles are used, the tape of which shrinks less well.

When restoring handles on pliers, the tape is wound turn to turn from beginning to end, and then wound back. Then its edge is stretched and pulled to the side, where it is fixed with a finger. The wound tape is heated with a hairdryer until it is pressed tightly along the entire length of the handle.After this, winding continues again up to the end of the handle, and down.

Each pass of 2 layers needs to be set with a hairdryer. Winding is done until the handle is of the required thickness. It is important to alternate between winding and shrinking. If you try to shrink many layers at once, the bottom tape will not tighten. In this case, the handle will rotate using the pliers.

To fix the tape, it must first be cut, leaving an edge of 10 cm. Then its end is inserted under the previous turn. You need to make an ordinary knot. The tape is stretched and heated with a hairdryer. When heat shrinking, the knot will be securely tightened and nothing will unwind. The protruding end is cut off, the remaining short tail is heated quite strongly with a hairdryer until it melts and is smoothed.

In a similar way, you can repair cracks on the handles of chisels, files, and rasps. Since in this case the winding is carried out on wood, which needs to be compressed very tightly, shrinkage is done after each layer. This is also necessary because such a handle cannot be thickened, so it will not be possible to wind more than two layers.

PET tape can also be used to repair the handles of hammers, axes, shovel handles and much more.

The material is a dielectric, it does not rot, and is quite resistant to oil products, so a tool repaired with tape can still serve no worse than before.