Re: acrylic; motors

[Subscuba@aol.com]

In a message dated 8/8/99 11:53:56 PM Eastern Daylight Time, buchner@wcta.net 
writes:

David,

I ended up making my forward port using polycarbonate also using my wife's 
oven. The polycarbonate was a lot more difficult since you have to bake it at 
about 200 F for about three days before raising the oven temperature to the 
forming temperature. This is necessary to drive the absorbed water. 
Polycarbonate is very shock or impact resistant compared to acrylic which is 
why I used it as the leading bow port. I used 1/4 inch thick (wet sub). The 
acrylic is a much easier material to work with and I think it is less 
susceptible to UV problems.

One of the real problems I had was that the oven was small and restricted the 
size of the port. I used a Wok as the mold.

The white paper included some of my results thanks to Ray's graciousness.

Have fun,

Ken Martindale



<< 
 I just used our regular gas oven. There's a little smell, but melting mess 
(as mentioned in the "white paper" on the website) isn't a problem at this 
temperature. Wear gloves, because things that come out of the oven are HOT. 
Ouch. The piece I used was small enough, because my window-hole is only about 
ten inches in diameter, that I didn't have any problem fitting it on the rack 
of our tiny oven. If it was bigger, I could have taken out the racks and 
stood it vertically.
  >>