Conor’s Little Dangly Bits

We've had a big-assed 50L Brabantia bin for the past 6 years or so. In their wisdom, Brabantia realise that the crappy catches they put on their bins break regularly and not only provide a spare but make it very easy to order another:

Unfortunately, what they didn't suss was basic mechanical engineering and the fracture mechanics of 5 children whacking the bin-lid hard every time they opened and closed it. So in no time at all the bit which held the catch broke.

Solution 1: Superglue. Rubbish. Lasted precisely one whack from a 4year old.

Solution 2: Epoxy Resin. Used this multiple times over several years. Worked reasonably well. But a pain in the ass to apply since it oozes in everywhere and actually seized up one of the catches. Also goes brittle eventually and breaks away.

Solution 3: Double-sided mounting tape. Tried this recently with surprisingly good results. As it is flexible, it can handle the whackage. Lasted about 2 months until the oozage of the sticky bits made it fall off.

Solution 4: Sugru. I think it may be the perfect solution. Sticky but not oozy to apply. Hard but flexible to handle impact. Has bulk so the load can be spread across a wider area. Two days in and all is well. I'll report back if it ever breaks.

 

UPDATE 1: Title changed from "Bloody Brabantia Bin" to "Lovely Brabantia Bin" because they reached out to me on Twitter and pointed out that I could get an entire replacement lid for free on their web-site under the 10 year guarantee. Fantastic customer service. But a bit of Googling reveals the problem above is rampant which surely must be costing them a fortune? I hereby offer my Sugru "distributed load" design to Brabantia's engineers for free :-)