Hdpe plastic

yes hdpe can be recycled at home i have done it with many containers including milk jugs and detergent bottles and 5 gallon buckets. i melt it by shredding the containers in a shredder putting it in the oven at 330-340 degrees farenheit and knead it like dough with oven proof gloves when it melts this will completely mix the flakes of hdpe together to prevent invisible areas of stress between the melted flakes. after this i take the melted blob of plastic and since hdpe is a very thick consistency when melted almost like taffy which is normal it has to be clamped down in a mold with c clamps. after this i wait about an hour or two then remove it from the mold and finish it with a planer to make the surface nice and uniform. some things that may be worth knowing is that the containers must be very clean this will prevent dirt and areas of weakness in the sheet. also dont overheat the plastic milk jugs turn clear when melted and you dont want to heat it too long after it turns clear or is melted this will prevent the plastic from turning yellow and degrading. also its better to stick with the same type of container in the mold for example if your melting milk jugs into a block use milk jugs for the whole thing this is because there is different types of hdpe with different viscositys that may not melt together uniformly. i eventually plan to make a filament extruder which basically extrudes the hdpe into a long plastic wire and than chop it up into pellets this is because pellets will probably melt more uniformly than flakes but its not neccessary to do it this way.