Upcycle an Old Record Into a Beautiful Bird Feeder!
1 Material
$1
1 Hour
Easy
My husband recently acquired an old record console and has since become obsessed with collecting records. And in his search for records, he has been "gifted" many old record collections from family and friends. Some of them have been good, but many of them were so scratched up and damaged that they didn't work. I didn't want to toss them, so I knew I had to upcycle them. And we did!
What you'll need for this DIY:
old records
metal bowl
acrylic paints and paintbrush
spray acrylic sealer
drill and drill bit
chain for hanging
Start off by painting your records with your acrylic paint. You can also paint them after you have molded them, but it is much easier to paint them when they are laying flat. The paint may crack a little in the areas where it bends while it's molding, so if a perfect paint job is what you want, then you can paint it after it's molded into it's new shape.
Now, preheat your oven to 200*F. Set your metal bowl upside down on the middle rack of your oven. Place your record, PAINTED SIDE UP, on the middle of your bowl. Depending on your oven, it will take from 3-5 minutes for your record to heat up and soften. You will know when it's ready when the sides of your record fall against the edges of your bowl.
When your record is soft, use hot pads to pull your record and your bowl out of the oven. Set them on another oven mit and with your hot pads, mold them into a bowl shape so that the sides are folded in a bit, similar to the picture above. Hold them in place until the record has cooled and it maintains it's shape.
When your record is cooled, spray the outside with an acrylic sealer to protect your paint job.
You will need to use a drill to put a few holes in your feeder to hold the chains. I bought one of these hanging baskets from the dollar store so that my chains were all ready to go. The baskets had 3 chains going into one, so I put 3 holes into my feeder so that I could use the chain exactly as it was. Try to space out your 3 holes evenly around your record so that your feeder hangs straight. If it doesn't it's no problem, just remove a chain link or 2 until it hangs evenly.
You will also need to drill a few small holes in the bottom of the feeder to drain water out from when it rains. Make sure your holes are big enough to drain the water, but not too big so that the seed doesn't fall out of the bottom.
Then all you will need to do is attach your chains to your feeder, add some bird seed and then hang it up!
You can find more great DIY's like this at our blog CrazyDiyMom.
Want more details about this and other DIY projects? Check out my blog post!
Comments
Join the conversation
2 of 67 comments
-
will try it in summer
-
yes
Frequently asked questions
Have a question about this project?