Okay so, several questions. All the acrylic that I remember seeing a bit ago in the old boiler room seems to have been moved? Or I’m just remembering incorrectly, but any info on that would be great! There didn’t seem to be as many colors as I recall seeing tbe first time
Second question is for where to get more acrylic? The Yard Store has been recommended recently, but I’m still new to Wichita so any other recommendations (even online) are welcome.
3rd question is about the laser cutter parameter tests I saw in the FabLab. Is there one for acrylics or is it just way more simple than I think so it doesn’t require one? I’m still new so coming up with power and speed, I assume, will take trial and error. However if there are already parameters for that, I think it would be helpful to have them already posted up like the others.
Last question is about adhesives. I’ve watched several videos on this topic, but was curious which ones we have in the lab to use before I go opening random containers of things lol.
About half of the acrylic in the boiler room is on the bottom shelf under the plants.
Lustercraft on south Meridian has also been suggested as a local source. I assume there’s some type of story behind it, but our wiki says to be very careful with acrylic from the Yard and to make sure it still has the original backing.
As far as cutting/engraving it, for engraving I’ve had lots of success around 150mm/s and 20% power for what I do. For cutting, you’ll want to go very slow maybe as low as 10 mm/s and crank up power to 80%. Some of it is so thick I’ve had to do multiple passes to cut all the way through.
The problem with “acrylic” from the yard store has been that sometimes they mislabel polycarbonate as acrylic.
It’s easy enough to surreptitiously test by seeing how easily it scratches with a coin.
A potential exists that any actual acrylic with the original backing might be so old that it’s a major pain to peel the backing off, but there are ways to deal with that.
100%, The note there is because things sometimes aren’t accurate. I love the Yard, They get a lot of interesting stuff and sometimes it’s not labeled well along that chain. In particular, What prompted the warning is that there was some red ‘acrylic’ which when flame tested showed presence of chlorine. If you are at all familiar with history in the form of WW1, you know that’s BAD. To double up on the whole nasty choking to death thing, if it doesn’t do that, It will eat the optics in the laser as well. I’m not sure exactly what it is, we used to have a frame with it (partially cut, partially melted), and a note about it, but no idea what happened to that when we moved. The sheets (I still have some) can be machined (it’s not the best). In looking for what they are, I don’t think they are PC. I suspect they are acrylic-polyvinyl chloride (so not entirely inaccurate) sheets, but can’t test it. (Someone could, but not me at least without more research. Most of the non-scary solvents I can think of mostly work similar on a few plastics, and for some reason I don’t want to burn enough of it to get a good spectra off it.)
The reason for the original backing is that most of the time it says what it is, I’ve seen ‘proper’ acrylic sheets at the yard with the backing identifying them, and then check. Or Polycarbonate or other things. Just cheap ‘acrylic’ though shouldn’t be purchased unless you can make sure it’s not something dangerous.
Removing old backing often just requires soaking in hot soapy water then using a soft scraper. The plastic spatulas made for spackling work.
Really old backing is sometimes so brittle that it comes off in very small pieces and is more work than it’s worth for anything more than a square foot or so.
Naptha, Goo Gone, rubbing alcohol and vegetable oil are sometimes recommended. All those have potential issues. Rubbing alcohol might leave a permanent haze. Naptha might contain impurities that will cause a permanent orange peel effect. Oil might interfere with solvent bonding. Goo Gone can do all of the above. Test on a place that will be discarded if at all possible.
I use plastic razor blades to remove acrylic backing and haven’t noticed any scratches yet! Though I also haven’t had to deal with any pesky super hard to remove backing recently…
I tend to just buy from the big lumber stores or The Yard, but when I need a certain thing and am having trouble finding it… I go talk to Regal. They arent the cheapest in direct comparison. But they can get you what you need.
that’s very helpful!!!