lol slug says cold and bladed, Oclocker says warmth. Can we make up our respective minds? Im eager to get to the acryillic part of MY mod. I distinctly remember G-Gnome cutting the acryillic with a hacksaw exclusively near the end of the Orac project with minimal support. Advice for strength, speed of cut, ect?
Use a high tooth count blade, very very little down force, and medium speed. You'll get a feel for it after a while. And "warm" is very relative. I would recommend working with the sheets in a temperature range from 50f to 120f but nothing beyond those temperatures if possible.
warm is relative, I say around room temperature, too much colder and vibration has a good chance of killing the plastic, too much hotter and you're already getting close to the low melting points. Then some effort should be made to keep the part cooled as plastics don't lose heat as fast as metals and if they start melting it gets messy
ok, thanx for that part. How bout the quality? It was said to aviod the trashy home-deopt plastics, whats the differance between that and modding-exclusive plastic?
there's nothing as "modding exclusive" plastic, but there is a marketed difference in the cheapy extruded acrylic you'll find at home repair places and the slightly more expensive cast acrylic that generally goes under brand names like lucite and such. Depends on what you need and what you're trying to do. Cast acrylic cuts a better and is more scratch resistant, but if you're say just making a simple shape for a window extruded sheet acrylic is perfectly fine. They have slightly different machining qualities really and in most cases extruded acrylic is more brittle and not as fun to cut
In my recent experience, extruded acrylic is MUCH more brittle than cast acrylic. Although the cast acrylic I've been working with doesn't machine well when expanding holes with slightly large diameter bits. If in the US, McMaster Carr carries some nice cast acrylic sheets. They're not branded though.
Beyond just tangible differences in how the materials behave when worked on, I will say that the junk plastics at home depot produce some of the most vile fumes imaginable.
Don't say that!! I bought two sheets of Lexan there a few weeks ago. None of the cheapo acrylic though. Now you've got me worried!
Stuey, if it's got the Lexan brand name on it, I wouldn't be worried. However, if it's just some generic run of the mill plastic, it might be a cause for concern.
