Does anyone have any experience with forming acrylic? What i want is a dome shaped semi-sphere of acrylic. The semi-sphere its self would have bubbles to add texture to the object.

Some questions:
What kind of equipment would i need?
Would the acrylic maintain its ridgity?
Would the width of the sheet impede its maleability? I was considering .25" sheets.

I can't wait till i can start on my project. Hopefully it'll turn out like I envision.

I have formed some acrylic with just a heat gun and patience. I overheated the plastic and it did get bubbles in it, I didn't want bubbles, but it is easy to get them if you do.

I have some 1/4" acrylic out in my shop, hang on I will go and see how to make a spherical shape.......

we played around with some acrylic back in shop class back i the day and we softened it with basically a space heater, plug it in ans it gets hot enough to heat a small room. lay the plastic on there for a few seconds and it'll get soft and then just play with it. it may take a few tries to get it to the right temperature and consistency and what-not, but that should work.

Mist is right, it is not all that hard. Just keep in mind that when you shape the plastic around a sphere to shapeit, the sides are going to gather some. Imagine taking a square sheet, bring all four corners together and all that extra plastic along the sides won't have anywhere to go. I work with metal, forming parts. Plastic acted alot like it.
Remember when you are forming that where you apply the heat the plastic will expand. If you heat it up like Mist told you to and then used a heat gun to pull and push the plastic, you shouldn't have any trouble after some practice. I just formed a sphere, with .25" acrylic and a blow torch.... because I am not patient and I just wanted to know how it was going to act, to help a no0b.

Welcome Ferret, its gonna take awhile before I call you Mr.Ferret.
Keep us posted on your project.

Another common practice is to make a plug (male mold) of the shape you are looking for. Take the sheet of acrylic and clamp it in to a wooden frame. The frame allows you to apply a more even pressure over the entire sheet of plastic, providing a smoother draw as you pull the plastic over the plug. You heat the sheet while pulling the frame over the plug. This is one way custom canopies are made for concept or experimental cars with the addtion of vacuumn that sucks the plastic sheet down over the plug. It can be done with out the vacuumn, but you have to be more on top of it.

The plug can be made of wood, clay or any other malletable material. However if made of wood, it would have to be sanded pretty smooth so as not to leave a grain impression in the plastic

you could do what my dad dose. he builds a fiberglass mold and heats the arcrylic with a heat gun and bernz-o-matic. the pros use a vacume former.

Thanks for the info. I'm still waiting for my mobo and psu to ship so i'm kinda at a halt in my planning phase.

Right now i'm considering constructing a male plug mold that I could press the sheet down onto. The sheet would be clamped tightly to a wooden frame so pressure could be consistantly applied. To heat the acrylic, a space heater or heat gun should fit the bill. I'll go out to Home Depot to pick up some of the cheaper .125" to get my technique down. Maybe i wouldn't need a mold, i'll just have to see.

Once again, thanks for all of the info and suggestions. Hopefully i'll have interesting pics in a few months.

that may be a bit too thin, and it will definately act differently when you are working with it. you may just have to suck up the price and get some of whatever size you are planning on using. I know that isn't always easy, I know I really can't afford to be buying a lot of material that may very well be wasted, but i'm not sure that working with that thin of a sheet will give you a good idea of how the thicker stuff will feel.

if that is what you plan on using for the end product then great, but it will not feel the same as, asy, the 1/2" or 1/4" stuff.


Now on a somewhat related point. I'm not trying to hijack the thread but I don't want open a new thread when this should fit in fine here.

I am going to be trying to do some custom work with fiberglass (not computer-related) and i have heard prety much the same method is used with the plug (which is why i bring this up here) if you use fiberglass sheets, but I can't seem tom find "fiberglass sheets." is there a "real" name for them or are they just not sold at Home Depot kind of stores? anyone familiar with that stuff? (Insomniac, OMFG?!?!) where can i find some?

for anyone interrested, the project is a custom, full legnth console for my car. replacing the front and rear benches with buckets and going to try to make a console that will make them look good in there, like what they do with, say, the new Pontiac Grand Prix. also going to need to make a custom dash too so this may take a while to get the money (might as well get all new digital gagues while i'm at it ) but i'm spending that time well in the design process

please e-mail, PM or IM, YIM, MSN, ICQ or IRC (all nicknames\screen names are the same as here, e-mail is at yahoo, msn is at hotmail) me if you have done this before and want to talk about it. i don't really want to hijack this thread that far off topic

hey mist i can ususally find fiberglass matierals at our local West Marine.......I have a 35' choey lee, and I can usaly find matierals for fiber glass repair and manufacter there
so she doesnt sink


Fiberglass woven

is this what your looking for? Let me know if i can help

WestMarine

You can also pick up fiberglass in in cloth


And matted


i would recomend using this with West System 105 Epoxy Resin and 205 Hardener

EDIT- the woven cloth is going to give you the strongst structural streanth, but you are going to pay twice as much for it. Fiberglass mat is probably the easiest to shape and i have used in many times to repair a dameged hull. although i cant say ive dont what you doing, i did redo the quarter panel of my friends truck

damn, you know.. i never thouhgt of a marine place. rather stupid of me. thanks. the sheets are what I am looking for, that was recommended to me form someone that has done this so unless someone suggests otherwise I'll give that a shot. happen to have a rough idea what the stuff goes for?

Mat- 10.99 38"x30"
Cloth- 12.99 38"x30"
Woven - 25.99 50"x24"

Woven Fiberglass

Matted
Cloth

EDIT- Just make sure you wash your hands really good after youve handled this stuff, its not fun to chew on

sweet. thanks man. i was just a few towns over arlier today and found one of their stores, but they were closed already so i'll check it out next time i'm out that way.