Being cyclists, we were doing the resuable-water-bottle thing long before it became trendy, but now that we use hydration packs, we just tote bottles along when we’re driving or on some other sort of outing. Eventually the bottles wear out / get lost and we page a new one in from the essentially infinite stash in the bottle cupboard.
This one had a cap that simply couldn’t be pried open with bare hands, no how, no way. I eventually got it open by main force and the threat of high temperatures.
Turns out there were two problems: the aperture in the pull-up ring is a wee bit small on the sealing nub and the ridge on the screw cap is about two wee bits large for the recess in the ring.
The former succumbed to an O (letter Oh) drill, which I pulled & pushed through the hole by hand to enlarge the aperture from 0.320 to 0.332. It still seals reasonably well, although it’ll pee a thin stream under more pressure than you should apply to such a bottle, which means I put a slight scratch on the aperture.
The latter required gently shaving the ridge with a box cutter (gasp). It’s still rather stiff, but entirely workable. That doesn’t affect the seal, because the ring’s skirt is a snug fit against the screw cap.
Why not just throw the fool thing out? After all, it’s just a freebie water bottle…
We run on the “Use it up, wear it out, fix it once, wear it out again, then put it on the shelf because maybe you can use the parts for something” principle.
Now, that’s not the way things are done these days, but it works for us…
The Smell of Molten Projects in the Morning 