Goodbye Freecycle

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Goodbye Freecycle
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Mustang

Joined: 15 Jul 2005
Posts: 768
Location: Sunny Suffolk

Posted: Mon Jul 28, 14 9:01 pm Post subject:

Lloyd wrote:

Mustang wrote:

Many (most?) uk freecycle groups moved to create Freegle a while ago when Freecycle USA went in a direction which we found unpleasant.

I'm curious to know more?

A bit of history.

Linky

Lloyd

Joined: 24 Jan 2005
Posts: 2699

Posted: Mon Jul 28, 14 9:18 pm Post subject:
Cheers

SteveP

Joined: 23 Jan 2008
Posts: 155
Location: North Devon

Posted: Tue Jul 29, 14 7:39 am Post subject:
Thanks, I will give Freegle a go.

Florence

Joined: 15 Mar 2025
Posts: 53

Posted: Fri May 02, 25 9:21 am Post subject:

Another old one that I've just come across (these new joiners who read the back threads ....). I well remember the days of Freecycle versus Freegle

Nowadays the local Facebook seems to be the place for disposing of things. Facebook Marketplace has done some of my family well for household contents.

But locally, nowadays stuff that is better than the tip appears on the local Facebook Pages. There are also Facebook swap pages for local areas. I have looked at the Freecycle pages recently and it's not at all well used. Gone out of fashion methinks.

Mistress Rose

Joined: 21 Jul 2011
Posts: 16337

Posted: Sat May 03, 25 6:39 am Post subject:
I have never used Freecycle, but I know our local FB group often has things posted on it. Some people also put things outside their houses but in some areas I know this can lead to a charge of flytipping, which is rather silly if it is taken in each day and not just left.

Florence

Joined: 15 Mar 2025
Posts: 53

Posted: Sun May 04, 25 9:24 am Post subject:

Yep the fly tipping thing does sometimes happen. Combination of stuff that ought to have been taken to the tip but the "owner" is too idle or the person wanting it doesn't turn up. Or difficult neighbours.

But usually free stuff goes - either taken by someone or taken to the tip. Trouble is our tip now doesn't open Tuesday and Wednesday so if those are your days off work - difficult. Of course there are those who say they will take it to the tip at a cost and fly tip.

I used to use Freecycle till Facebook became a better system. Or I could get the family to go to the tip for me (they've moved so it's a case of knowing who will take money, is reliable, honest and so on if there's a heap for the tip).

Nicky cigreen

Joined: 25 Jun 2007
Posts: 9937
Location: Devon, uk

Posted: Sun May 04, 25 10:23 am Post subject:
I get rid of a lot of stuff by sticking it outside with a 'free' sign on it - helps that I live in a village and I have space on my own property to put it. another place to get rid of things that are still useful is the local recycling centre. They have a shop to resale.

gz

Joined: 23 Jan 2009
Posts: 9098
Location: Ayrshire, Scotland

Posted: Sun May 04, 25 4:37 pm Post subject:
I found Freegle better...more for UK conditions, Freecycle is too USA style

Mistress Rose

Joined: 21 Jul 2011
Posts: 16337

Posted: Mon May 05, 25 6:48 am Post subject:
Our recycling centre used to have a shop; haven't been there for years, so don't know if they still have. I got a new Hidome pressure cooker there years ago for a couple of pounds. It was stored in the larder for years, but my old one, 50 years old now, had to be retired, so I am using the new one. Bargain.

Florence

Joined: 15 Mar 2025
Posts: 53

Posted: Mon May 05, 25 8:31 am Post subject:

I live in a northern county which is sadly lacking in most forms of recycling unless you go to the appropriate outlying site with skips - usually just for glass. Recycling tetra paks seems to have gone awol - think the firm that offered to take these withdrew when it found out how far it was between villages/recycling points and made a loss.

As for shops at tips - seems to be that only "totters" with a licence can take goods to sell on up here. So it's charity shops which are limited in what they can take or your local Facebook and advertise on your local town/village pages or go to Facebook Market place.

If you are lucky and live in the right place you may well get one of the bigger charities that take and sell on half decent furniture. Rather leaves out electrics such as cookers, fridges, freezers if you are down sizing.

dpack

Joined: 02 Jul 2005
Posts: 43966
Location: yes

Posted: Mon May 05, 25 3:06 pm Post subject:

has it got a PAT ticket? is a big problem with electrical stuff, probably sensible(most folk could not assess or rewire it)

recycling is patchy geographically and a fair bit of is greenwashing/tick boxing

some stuff is easy and prized by the trade, glass , paper/cardboard, al and fe cans

most local collections do not do metals, fabrics, electricals, nor most/any plastics although all could have a value as economically viable resources if collected and sorted for processing and reuse

tetra packs are mixed "ore", technically they can be, but not in an economically viable way

the days of ashes and broken crockery being the only thing in the bin are long gone

landfill metal rich electricals and dig holes for lower grade ore make no sense to me
maybe i should get ambitious with getting money to make good ideas manifest

as mixed ore consumer electronics have lots of potential, Au,Cu,Sn,"rares" etc and quite a bit of energy rich plastics are in far greater concentrations than they are in most mined ores or rf gold hunting across big red deserts

Florence

Joined: 15 Mar 2025
Posts: 53

Posted: Mon May 05, 25 7:16 pm Post subject:

Some of the local charities that take small electricals (kettles type) will have a PAT tester who does it free for a small number of items to support said charity. But unusual.

We've recently had an improvement on the plastics front in that you can now chuck plastic drink bottles and similar in the recycling bin with the lids on.

Electrical stuff is a minefield. Phones and computers even more so.

Mistress Rose

Joined: 21 Jul 2011
Posts: 16337

Posted: Tue May 06, 25 7:19 am Post subject:

Agree with Dpack, but sadly plastics are problematic in that they can be 'mixed' in the same sheet because they are laminated. We can put plastic bottles in our kerbside recycling and several shops will take 'soft' plastic. Still working out if we can recycle the wrapper from cheese which says 'not recyclable' but they say in the shop I bought it that they will take it as recycling. Feels very flexible, so at a guess, polythene or similar.

Electricals, as you say Dpack, are a real mine of metals, but need a lot of sorting and stripping. Possible, but as with a lot of these things is it 'economic'.

Nicky cigreen

Joined: 25 Jun 2007
Posts: 9937
Location: Devon, uk

Posted: Tue May 06, 25 9:00 am Post subject:

I didn't realise there was a lack of tip shops in Northern counties. Here in SW England they are run by the council themselves - they weigh everything you buy, even ornaments, as they can declare all sold items as having been recycled, and furthermore they get some cash - I'm not sure what happens to that money - hopefully it goes towards the cost of running the recycling centre

electrical goods are always difficult to rehome - but I have found more charity shops have set themselves up with the correct testing so they can take electricals. Broken electricals are collected at my recycling centre for stripping down etc

plastics are a problem in that only a small percentage of those 'recycled' actually get recycled. 9 - 20% worldwide, 45% in the UK so although it feels virtuous to put it in the recycling sack, the best bet is to generate as little as possible.

dpack

Joined: 02 Jul 2005
Posts: 43966
Location: yes

Posted: Tue May 06, 25 12:59 pm Post subject:

Mistress Rose wrote:

that last bit, the chemistry and engineering is highly plausible, most has been tried
the business side needs to "reward" the disposer and get the item/s where they can be "refined" as well as processing the ore profitably to recover the useful metals and energy in a fairly tidy way

my choice would be harvest energy with a plasma furnace, ball mill the black slag, get chem/electrochem on the concentrate

messy would be a heap leach of minced electrical goods and take what lands in the activated charcoal leaving the plastics etc in the "washed" minced heap

very messy is send it to a poor country and children will use a wok to recover solder

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