Food Dispenser

by SP Riley in Living > Travel

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Food Dispenser

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I eat in my car. If you do too then you know that dry foods are best. However how do you eat those dry foods while driving? Instead of a cup that I hoped wouldn't dump the contents into my maw I made this. It is an on-the-go food dispenser.

Supplies

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Supplies:

You'll need a type 1 plastic bottle (check the recycling logo for types of plastic) with a cap, and with the inner diameter larger than your jar's outer diameter.

You'll need a jar with the lid that can come off and only leave the ring. You don't need the flat disk part of the top, and can turn that into a button or something. Bell jars are good for this. I went with a smaller kind since that fits my hand more comfortably.


Tools:

You'll need a sharp knife, like a box cutter.

You'll need a heat gun for shaping the plastic.

Reuse

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Simple enough, cut the top of the bottle off. You'll want enough material to go over the metal ring of jar.

Heat Gun

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This is the trickiest part so pay attention. Take off the cap from the top of the bottle. With the top of the bottle over the metal ring, while on the glass jar, gently heat the plastic. If your heat gun has a temperature setting, start with the lowest temperature. Rotate the jar while you are heating to get as uniform shrinkage. Fair warning this can go fast, so watch what you are doing.

Shrink the plastic until it is very snug around the metal ring.

Cutting

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Give things a few minutes to cool down so you don't burn yourself. Cut along the metal lip of the ring. I cut where the metal curls up, and that means the edge of the plastic isn't as exposed and doesn't feel sharp. Cut the remaining plastic off of the glass jar.

Fill and Go

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You're done. Fill this with whatever you want to take on the go and not dump in your face. I will not claim that these tops are air tight, I will not even claim that they are water tight. I will say that I made the red one a long time ago and it has served me well (sunflower seeds mostly).


So Why?

Somehow in my life I've gotten a lot of cereal. I'm not sure how that happened. I hate to waste things, so I eat dry cereal as a snack. When I have to go to work, or someplace else, and I want to take a snack, this works really well. The smaller jars fit into cup holders too. I'm sure you could put nuts or popcorn in there as well, but I don't have that. I also never had a good idea of what to do with jelly jars after I'm done with what was inside. So I wanted to reuse the jar, and the top of a plastic bottle. Now you can see what I did, and I hope it helps you too. :)