You can cut the plastic with a small-toothed hacksaw for metal or wood. It must be held at an angle of 25-30 ° C to the product and cut with slow movements so that the thermoplastic plastic does not heat up and does not melt from friction.
Instructions
Step 1
Polyfoam (which is produced in tiles with a thickness of 20-100 mm) is cut by melting. To do this, a nichrome wire is pulled between two insulated risers using a strong spring, a rheostat is connected in series and connected to the power grid. Under the action of the current, the wire heats up, and the foam sheet, if it is moved parallel to the table, melts evenly over the entire width, that is, a sheet of a certain thickness is formed.
Step 2
Instead of a spring that pulls the heated (and accordingly extended) wire, you can attach one end of it to a rigid riser, and throw the other over the block and pull it with a load.
Step 3
In the absence of a rheostat, which regulates the amount of heating of the wire, it is possible to pull the aligned part of the electric stove spiral, not separated from the rest of the spiral, between the risers. Then the main part of the spiral of the electric stove is a resistance, and the level part is a cutting (melting) element.
Step 4
Holes in plastic can be drilled with a sharp angle drill. Care must be taken that the plastic does not heat up, otherwise the drill will jam and may break.
Step 5
If there is no drill, the hole can be drilled with a nail, flattening its end in the form of a spatula and sharpening the working part at a slight angle. You will have to remove such a drill from the hole more often in order to remove the shavings.
Step 6
In thin products made of elastic plastics (polyethylene, polyvinyl chloride), holes can be made with a heated wire.
Step 7
It should be remembered that after mechanical processing (especially after drilling holes), cracks form in products made of polystyrene after 20-30 hours, which makes them unusable. To prevent cracking, after each operation (drilling individual holes or sawing out), immediately immerse the part for 5-7 minutes in water heated to 40-50 ° C. After completing the last operation, the part is kept in heated water for up to 8 hours.
Step 8
It is easy to bend sheet organic glass (plexiglass) if you heat it to 100 ° C by dipping it into boiling water. Heated up to 150 ° C (in an oven or oven), it can be formed in wooden molds upholstered with flannel so that there are no traces of wood on the finished products. In this way, for example, baths for photographic work are made.
Step 9
Plastics are sanded with emery skins, then polished with pastes, varnishes and solvents.
For polishing with pastes, you need to have polishing wheels made of felt and cotton cloth. On a felt wheel, rubbed with a polishing paste, the product is pre-polished. It is impossible to press the plastic in one place for a long time so that it does not heat up.
Step 10
The second polishing (finishing) is carried out on a cotton wheel, slightly smeared with polishing paste. Sometimes the final polishing is done without paste, directly on a cotton wheel or on a brush.
Step 11
Mostly large surfaces are polished with polish, or when there is no polishing wheel. Cases for radio, boxes, panels, pre-sanded with skin, are polished with shellac polish using a tampon, just like a wooden surface.
Step 12
Polishing with solvents is the same as polishing, but in this method, the solvent poured onto the tampon dissolves the plastic. Celluloid products are mainly used for polishing with solvents.
Step 13
There is also such a method of polishing: a small amount of solvent is poured into a teapot for brewing tea and placed in a water bath. Heating evaporates the solvent through the nozzle. If you quickly move the sanded surface of the plastic over the vapor of the solvent, then small droplets of the solvent condense on it, after the evaporation of which, a shiny surface is formed.
