DIY Trash Grabber Project

Earth Day is coming up, but around here we like to think of every day as Earth Day! One of our goals is to always keep our neighborhoods clean. This means cleaning up the trash. Doing neighborhood clean ups is a fantastic way to get kids involved in protecting our environment, but they may not always be the most enthusiastic. So today we have a really fun STEM project building a simple DIY Trash Grabber. With this nifty tool, kids will be excited to help clean up the trash! Plus they will learn some STEM skills along the way. It’s a win for the kids and a win for the environment!

Trash Grabber STEM Project for Earth Day

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One of the best ways to get kids excited about a project, is to help them take ownership of the activity and really make it their own. Now picking up trash might seem like something kids really would not like to do, BUT, if you have them make one of these nifty trash grabbers, that they can decorate and make into their own special tool, suddenly picking up trash is fun!

In this activity kids will be learning about engineering, physics and of course, the environment.

The best part is that this activity uses simple materials and only takes a very short amount of time to make. Perfect for the classroom, after school club, summer camp, or as a homeschool activity.

What is a Trash Grabber?

It is known by many different names like an articulated grabber, reach extender, grabber stick, helping hand, trash picker, picker-upper, grabber tool, or litter picker to name a few!

In short, this is a handheld, mechanical tool used to extend the range of a person’s reach when grabbing objects on the ground or or just out of reach.

How is the Trash Grabber different from hands?

Well, first, using the trash grabber helps keep your hands clean while picking up garbage. But it also has some other cool simularities and differences to our own natural grabbers… our hands!

Human hands have bones called phalanges in each of the fingers. Your fingers are attached to your arm which has the muscles and tendons needed for your fingers to work effectively. You can learn more about how hands work in this Biology STEM activity making an articulating hand.

The Trash Grabber we are making in this project doesn’t have bones, muscles, or tendons but does rely on your hands, bones, muscles, or tendons to make it work. Our hands are the motor and energy source to power these grabbers.

It is made up of wooden tongue depressors that are joined together (crisscrossed) in such a way, that it works as an extendable arm and has the same movement as scissors. We have seen this design in our Hydraulic Lift project.

How Does the Trash Grabber Work?

The handles start apart. This is when the grabber is at its shortest. When you pull the handles toward each other, the body of the Trash Grabber extends out in front of you to reach the trash on the floor or any other surface.

It only has two “fingers” or grips, one on each end of the grabber to grab the trash. Once you have grabbed the trash, you move the Trash Grabber over to the trash can, pull the handles away from each other and the trash falls into the trash can.

This DIY Trash Grabber becomes an extension of your arm that helps you pick up the trash without having to bend down or touch the trash.

It’s a safe and easy way to keep our environment clean! So, let’s make our very own Trash Grabber!

Trash Grabber Materials & Tools

12 Jumbo Craft Sticks (aka wood tongue depressors)
12-14 split-pins or brads
Glue gun (you can use wood glue, but you will have to wait for it to dry before going to the next step)
Ruler
Pencil
Box cutter
Scissors
Side-cutters
Drill
Sandpaper
Paint or felt-tip pens
Lots of ‘trash’ (nothing too heavy: pom poms, crumpled up paper, empty bottles, etc.)

Plus you will want to grab the templates which are available to STEAM Powered Family mailing list members.

DIY Grabber Video Tutorial

One of the best ways to learn how to do this project is to watch our tutorial video. If you can’t see the video, the feed is being blocked by your adblockers or firewall. You can also find the video tutorial (with closed captioning) on the STEAM Powered Family YouTube Channel.

Making a DIY Trash Grabber – Step-by-Step Directions

Getting the pieces ready

Print out the templates. You will need them to make all the holes and it helps with the positioning of the handle and grips on the end.

Start by marking all the holes to be drilled. The first page of the templates will guide you.

Pro Tip! Ensure that all the holes are in the middle of the sticks and in a perfectly straight line.

The pieces for the grips need to be cut. Use a ruler and a box cutter and make many light cuts into the wood, gently bend the wood up and down until it snaps off in a clean line.

You should use some sandpaper to get any rough edges away.

Now that all the pieces are ready reach for the second page of the templates that has a drawing of the position of all the sticks. Keep that nearby.

Going back to the first page. You are going to glue the “fingers” on.

Start at the bottom of the page. Place a stick that has two holes onto the diagram. Place one of the “fingers” onto the stick and mark the curve with a pencil. It makes it easier to see where the glue goes. Glue the finger onto the front, turn the stick over, and glue the other “finger” onto the stick, lining the two “fingers” up.

Repeat this step for the other side.

To join the two handles together, place a stick with two holes onto the template, and at 90 degrees, place a stick with no holes. Mark the curve and glue the two together.

Repeat this step for the other handle.

Turn the two handle pieces over and glue a stick with no holes at the back of the same stick you glued on previously. This action makes your trash grabber somewhat stronger.

Decorating your Trash Grabber

It is almost time to join all the pieces, but this is the time for you to decorate all the pieces of your trash grabber using paint or felt-tip pens.

I made the mistake of putting my trash grabber together first and then decorating it. This was not an easy feat!

Putting your Trash Grabber together

Place the template page with the picture of the completed trash grabber in front of you. This will make the build a whole lot easier for you.

Start with the top section, Join the two “finger” pieces together in the middle with a split-pin or brad. Ensure that the “fingers” are facing inward.

If your split pin is too long, use a side-cutter to cut a bit of each of the “legs”.

Now join two pieces with three holes each together in the middle with another split-pin.

Place this piece on top of the first piece you joined together and use split pins in both holes to join it all together.

The last step is to take the two handle pieces, join them together in the middle, and then onto the rest of your trash grabber.

Hold the handles, pull them apart, and then push them together to watch the Trash Grabber in action.

Wow! It works!

At this point, here is a word of caution:

This Trash Grabber is not very strong, as it is made with thin, wooden sticks and it will not allow you to pick up heavy objects. We did this intentionally, to keep this project easy and using simple materials available in most classrooms. It will bow and bend under pressure and possibly snap, so be selective with the trash you are going to use the grabber on. Challenge your older kids to come up with materials or design changes that will increase the strength of their grabbers.

Testing your Trash Grabber

Find a trash can, gather some trash, and start testing your grabber.

To pick up heavier objects, it would need to be made of metal.

If you wanted to you could make your grabber a little stronger by doubling up on all the single sticks. Test your grabber first and then make another one doing just that and see if it is stronger.

Improving your Trash Grabber

I drilled holes for 4 more split pins or brads, for extra support on the handles & “fingers” after completing the build. What do you think? Do you prefer the extra support?

With this design, the grabber wraps its “fingers” around the object you would like to put in the trash. Some objects will slip out of their grip. What would you add to the fingers to create friction between the wood and the trash you have picked up? Some ideas we came up with that would improve the “grip” of our grabber included: rubber bands, craft foam, toothpicks, etc.

Maybe you have an idea to build a better Trash Grabber. Perhaps you can use different materials to help increase the strength of the grabber when picking up heavier objects. Or, do you have an idea for a design that would reach farther, pick up heavier objects, or be more efficient? Why not challenge yourself and give it a go? This could make a great science fair project!

Have fun cleaning up and protecting our planet, and learning a little STEM!