Several years ago, our geo-friend, Tuma, worked for a company that utilizes “preforms.” During his tenure, he collected numerous shapes and sizes of discarded preforms, and today, they have been “recycled” into excellent geocache containers. Not surprisingly, many, but certainly not all, of Tuma’s caches are preforms.
What are preforms?
We use preforms nearly every day, but most folks take little notice of the clear plastic used for containing and transporting numerous products: soda bottles, water bottles, juice bottles, adult beverage bottles, liquid soap bottles, peanut and peanut butter jars, mayonnaise jars, are just a few examples.
Preforms are made from a plastic called PET (polyethylene terephthalate). The PET is formed into containers such as the one you are seeking. At the final manufacturing destination, PET preforms are placed into a heated mold, a rod is inserted, and high-pressure hot air forces the molten preform to expand into the shape of the mold. The entire process, from preform to finished bottle or jar, happens in a fraction of a second. One processing machine can create over 10,000 soda bottles per hour!
Preforms that will be transformed into soda bottles.
Advantages of PET bottles.
- They are light weight, which decreases transportation costs.
- They do not break, such as glass bottles and jars; no broken shards of glass.
- They can be recycled; roughly 10% of recycled PET is used in making new preforms.
You can view how preforms are manufactured at: www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZfyPCujUPms.
Thanks much for sharing your preforms, Tuma; they are much appreciated!