It has been my observation that the bigger the ice cube the longer it will last. There is an upper limit of what will fit into the container, but regular ice cubes seem to be getting smaller, and the trays flimsier. After much observation and many trials, the Dannon Yogurt cups have the amazing property of popping the ice free even after many uses, and not getting damaged themselves, I also bought a lot of acrylic only to discover that some of it is extruded and useless for high detail. the cups themselves do not sit flat in the freezer and filling them one at a time iffy anyway.
So we have a use for the extruded Acrylic, the used yogurt containers, and I can get Ice âcubesâ that fit my containers;
I have been thinking for months about how to make a reasonable Icemaker to make ice the size I wanted. I was thinking about blown acrylic with wood and cut holes as places to balloon up but accomplishing the pressure system I have not managed as yet. I was thinking a blown truck inner tube as both rubber and the air valve to place the pressure but I donât get around enough to have accomplished that as yet.
Have you looked into the silicone soap molds? They make fabulous ice trays, and you can get whatever size/shape ice you want out of the deal from cubed to round or Death Stars and Lego blocks.
And itâs easy to remove the ice when you need it.
For ice that size, one of the silicone muffin tins would work just as well. Jumbo muffins would go even larger than that.
Iâve used them for freezing 1 cup pucks of stock when I do a fresh batch. Much easier to store them that way and not have to defrost a quart at a pop.
I was even getting to the point of making my own silicone molds, but again the design of things is easier than accomplishing the design (Why I bought the glowforge) but have not found the molds you are talking about, as I would have bought them,
As it happened the yogurt cups are the perfect diameter and could only be improved upon by being taller (but still fit in the ice making part of the freezer). even if I could paint the silicone on bottom of the ice tray I have would be something.
I love this project! Gonna steal it too. I make home made low-sugar popsicles by pouring a sugar free Jello plus powdered drink mix dissolved together, into those tiny Dixie cups and putting in a popsicle stick. The darn things are really hard to put in the freezerâalways wanting to tip over on the ribbed freezer bottom. This would totally solve that problem. Iâll have to look into the Dannon yogurt containers too. Thanks!
I have tried many things over the past few years, I first cut the straight sided water bottles, but they stretched and eventually broke. so i put a new one inside a stretched one and together they held but were hard to get out, the butter containers with curved edges could give enough not to stretch and break but were also big and hard to get the ice out, the Dannon containers have more angle on the side and the ice usually pops loose while still in the freezer.
As for the popsicle sticks, I bet you could make a second sheet that would hold those straight too
Oh and those heavy gauge bamboo skewers cut to length might even beat out popsicle sticks, unless you make your own from Glowforge scraps, (washed with alcohol and left in bleach for a few hours, and then water, and no trace of the laser cuts would be left)
It would be fun to have popsicle sticks with little hearts or such at the end.
Souper cool! I see you did the stick holders too! I ended up putting a rib down the middle to stabilise mine and that took the floppy right out of it. I like the pieces at the ends.
