Polystyrène

Insulating a house is one of the most important things you can do to reduce heating bills and make your home cosy and comfortable but, before starting out, it’s important to understand the potential complexities of insulating an old building. To achi

Dagun’s genesis began in 2016 at the Modelling the Railways of Queensland convention, with a chance purchase of an old Black Diamond Models 1460 class locomotive from the bring and buy table. This loco just happened to be my favourite class of QR loc

Being able to tilt the visor up means it doesn’t block your vision when riding with your head down. If you wear goggles while riding, some visors extend far enough up to allow you to ‘park’ them underneath when climbing. To hold the goggle strap secu

MICROPLASTICS are all over the news lately. Actually,these plastic bits 0.2 inches (5 mm) wide or smaller are all over everything—from our food to the insides of animals, and especially in the oceans. Most plastic is non-biodegradable. When someth

1▸ PET or PETE Polyethylene terephthalate is benign unless heated or scratched, in which case it could leach chemicals into food and beverages. It is used in many water and juice bottles and is recyclable. 2▸ HDPE High-density polyethylene is used to

Recyclability numbers on plastic containers are typically stamped within the triangular recycling symbol and tend to be very small. Use a magnifier to help find and read the transparent numbers. 1 Contains polyethylene terephthalate. Used to package

The truth about Polystyrene Pods. Polystyrene has been used in construction for decades. It is lightweight, 98% air, versatile, uses up to 50% recycled material and is 100% recyclable. All polystyrene manufacturers in NZ offer to collect polystyrene

• Greg Cleary’s Premium Flower Paste• Large soup spoon• Polystyrene rose cone• 20-gauge florist wire• Wire cutters• Apple trays (you can pick these up from your local grocer)• JEM Cutters 90mm easy rose cutter• Balling tool• Foam pad• Petal cutters S

Styrofoam boxes, nylon bags and recycled rubber are not just the materials of Shirley Tse’s sculptures; they are the subjects too. Born in Hong Kong and residing in the United States since 1992, Tse has been fascinated by the material histories of pl

The hot topic of conversation at dinner parties these days is no longer crime, schools or (heaven forbid) politics, it’s how to get off the grid. The rising cost of water and electricity, not to mention load shedding, has forced us all to look for wa

External wall insulation (EWI) is like wrapping your house in a duvet — in this case a strong, weatherproof duvet. Done well it makes the home warmer and more comfortable, and reduces heating bills. Done poorly it can create more problems than it sol

We all love a bargain, right? I know I do. So, the other night when I was browsing the internet, I was quite amazed by some of the motorcycling items that I came across at very competitive prices. There were gloves, jackets, boots, and pretty much an

WORDS: GREG LEECH PICS: STOCK If there is one piece of rider equipment over which a rider should take special care, it’s his or her helmet. Walk into any major motorcycle retail outlet and you will be met with walls of helmets. It’s lid world, and w

DRYING excess food from the garden is a great way to spread the harvest and create new tastes. A solar dryer is even better because it uses the sun rather than electricity. And one made from a polystyrene vegie box is even better again because it tur

As mentioned in one of my previous articles (see FW, 24 July), polystyrene seedling trays are made by heating small polystyrene beads in a mould; they expand to fill the mould and thereby form the tray. The more pellets that are placed in the mould,

I HAVE several blocks of well-used Oasis foam which are about to fall to pieces. Can I use them in the base of large flower pots – like using crocks or polystyrene to reduce the amount of compost needed? Would they cause harm or not? They may be usef

For most of the caravan’s history, it has almost always contained wood. Not that wood is a bad thing, but technology has given engineers and designers modern materials with plenty of benefits that suit the caravan industry. Problems that caravans of

Made from casein, the protein found in milk, this has been in existence for more than a century but was replaced by synthetic plastics. Lactips have combined the protein with clay and a reactive molecule (glyceraldehyde) to make a hardier plastic tha

Cheap manufacturing and fast-changing trends mean we throw things away without a second thought. Fashion and recycling have worked in tandem for decades through upcycling and charity shops, but now designers are becoming increasingly adventurous, cre

SIPs consist of insulation bonded on each side to oriented strand board (OSB), although plywood or other materials are sometimes used. The insulating core can be solid rigid board made from expanded polystyrene (EPS) or injected fibre-free rigid uret

Insulation is one of the key elements to achieving a thermally efficient house, along with airtightness. But it can be difficult to know what’s best and how to get it right. How much do you need? Should it be natural or man-made? Is one a better insu

While other sports wait for trends to come to them, triathlon has a long, rich history of living at the cutting edge of technology and design. Multisport has led the pack in breaking trends, and while not every tri design is a home run, our sport is