Cagar Watch display, a watch innovation made from recycled plastic waste by the ITS Cagar team

ITS Campus, ITS News — Institut Teknologi Sepuluh Nopember (ITS) continues to strengthen its commitment to contributing to protecting the environment by reducing plastic waste that is still widely scattered. This effort is realized through the innovation of the ITS student team in the form of Cagar Watch, a contemporary watch that utilizes recycled plastic.

ITS Cagar team leader Senja Alfakori said that the innovation also encourages efforts to realize the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in point 12 regarding responsible consumption and production. “We utilize unused plastic materials as raw materials for making watches,” he explained.

Senja said that the innovation arose from the existence of plastic waste that had piled up in the surrounding environment, especially in the city of Surabaya. Not only that, the community is still unable to manage the plastic waste properly. “The community tends to just throw away the plastic waste,” said the student from the ITS Industrial Product Design Department (Despro).

The increasingly severe problem prompted Senja and his colleagues to recycle polypropylene as a watch frame because it has strong properties, is resistant to high temperatures, and can survive in humid conditions. In addition, polypropylene plastic is often found in various product packaging so it is not difficult to find.

View of one of the Cagar Watch models when worn by a user

The student from Bengkulu explained that the design of the Cagar Watch had to go through four stages, namely injection molding body, dial formation, assembly, and packaging. At the injection molding body stage, the collected polypropylene plastic waste will go through a heating process and then be molded according to the Cagar Watch design.

After producing the Cagar Watch frame, Senja added, the next stage is the dial formation process, namely designing the core components of the watch. After these two stages, the watch assembly process and product packaging will be carried out. “The packaging can add aesthetic and functional value to our products,” he said.

(from left) Senja Alfakori, Nisa Abiba, and Syahrian Arkan from the ITS Cagar team when receiving the 1st place award in the Improvement & Innovation Award competition

Through direct guidance from Despro ITS lecturer Alief Samboro ST MDs, Cagar Watch contributes positively to the environment and provides alternative environmentally friendly products to consumers. The watch also has a trendy design so that its use can also be used as a complement to today’s fashion needs.

Thanks to this innovation, the Cagar ITS team has also succeeded in winning first place in the Improvement & Innovation Award competition held by Pertamina Eksplorasi Energi (EP) Regional Java, recently. “Hopefully Cagar Watch can be utilized and become more widely known by the public,” he said hopefully. (ITS PUBLIC RELATIONS)

Reporter: ION 14