Acrylic material

I guess this part of the forum is where this should be.

There is a Bathfitter down the road a piece and my former wife who passed away in 2012 worked there as an accountant. I have since remarried. The manager there gave me some scrap acrylic material that they use. Bathfitter does bathtub remodeling by installing an acrylic liner right over your old tub and they use sheet acrylic to form shower surrounds. Some of you probably have seen the commercials on TV. There's another firm caller Re-Bath that does similar work. If you have one of these close by ask them for some scrap acrylic sheet. I have some 3MM thick and some 6MM thick (see photos). This material can be used for a million different things. If it's warped by standing against the wall or whatever it can be flattened by laying it on a straight piece of plywood maybe with a weight on top and put in a 200 degree oven for a little while or you could probably use a heat gun also. If it is sanded to get the gloss off it can be painted. I used some small pieces to repair an egg slicer after the original tabs broke off that held the slicer frame on the base (see photo). I also used some 6MM thick pieces to keep the grow tube on my lettuce hydro unit from rotating (see photo). I have used it for many other things too. It can be cut on a tablesaw but it is loud and rough. A bandsaw works well. It is machineable, can be drilled and tapped, etc. A new end mill makes a perfect hole in it. When drilled the hole is there but not with nice sharp edges, I hope this information proves useful.

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Thanks Floradawg! Great tip on new sources for acrylic. Unfortunately none of either store is very close to me but if I get by their way I'll stop in.

I use it a lot too for all sorts of things, like my Oxy/Mapp caddy, a custom countertop spice rack, brackets, covers, etc. I get my scraps from the local Tap Plastics for a buck or so per sqft and have a pretty good selection on hand now for all kinds of projects. Great stuff to work with but a bit sensitive to cutting/drilling/boring heats...my scroll saw works the best and use a water bath when boring large holes.

Thanks again!
PJ

Your material is clear. I'm not familiar with Tap plastics. Is that a local outfit?

Okay, I just looked it up. West coast area. I will research the Jackson, MS area for a supplier of plastics. Thanks for the info about this and the acrylic glue.

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Originally Posted by Floradawg

Okay, I just looked it up. West coast area. I will research the Jackson, MS area for a supplier of plastics. Thanks for the info about this and the acrylic glue.

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Yeah they are West Coast but they get theirs from one of the ~10 major suppliers in the country. Most cities I think have local suppliers I think, because it's used in all kinds of things from guards to display, etc.

I do tend to use the clear because it's most available but did make our Penzy's spice rack out of translucent green which match the ancient counter tops. The torch caddy also used some Smoke as it was the piece I had on hand to fit the shape I wanted. I also find black and white and other colors in the scrap bins and pick up a couple now and then when I'm bin diving.

Here a couple of pics of the spice rack.

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The retainers are just elastic cord my wife had and made some ferrules out of aluminum model tubing and crimped...Still holding up 5 years later. I put small notches in the end caps with a needle file to keep them in place at the right height to hold the jars.

Very nice.

I found a local outfit that carries the transparent kind. I haven't contacted them yet but I will ask if they have a bargain bin or scrap for cheap. Thanks.