• I want to thank all the members that have upgraded your accounts. I truly appreciate your support of the site monetarily. Supporting the site keeps this site up and running as a lot of work daily goes on behind the scenes. Click to Support Signs101 ...

Cutting Acrylic

K2

New Member
What do you use to cut acrylic substrate. I know you can scar it but surely theres an easier way, maybe skill saw or jig saw with a special blade? Thanks everyone.
 

GB2

Old Member
Your method may well be determined by the thickness of the acrylic you are trying to cut. Personally, I'd like to know how others are having success cutting 1/2" acrylic.
 

joeshaul

New Member
I used to cut half inch with a laser at my prior employer. That stuff was kinda scary and slow, since we only used one pass, but it looked damn sexy when you removed it, no finishing needed, unless the acrylic melted back together a little bit.

As to how I would do it now, probably a million passes on my small scale engraver for anything of shape.

Now I primarily deal with 1/8" and I usually just score and snap if it's just going to be rectangular, otherwise toss it on the engraver if it's small enough.
 

mortil

New Member
Your method may well be determined by the thickness of the acrylic you are trying to cut. Personally, I'd like to know how others are having success cutting 1/2" acrylic.

Cut it with a waterjet cutter (? is it called that? ) thats how we do it at work.
 

chopper

New Member
this would depend on the shape to be cut. if it was a simple square or rectangle I would cut it on the panel saw, if it was a custom shape I would use a cnc router.
//chopper
 

showcase 66

New Member
I used to have an acrylic hand cutter. Kind of like a utility knife but you had more control with it. Three passes with it and you could snap the last little bit of 1/2". Anymore I use a table saw or circular saw with the blade backwards. I use a finer tooth blade that is for thinner metal and it works perfectly. Usually no finishing to be done after.
 

artbot

New Member
get a track saw with a triple chip blade designed for plastics. it's better than a panel saw in that the material is held much tighter to the blade, the accuracy is "0" allowance. after you have a track saw at the shop and you are cutting everything from .030 petg to four sheets of plywood at once, you will wonder how you ever lived without it.
 

alcerkan

New Member
a CNC router with a diamond embedded bit=fast cutting and NO polishing. Is it worth $1900 for a bit to do this? Depends on your volume of acrylic work. Always remember: Time is Money. But Money is Money, too!
 

TheSnowman

New Member
I cut it w/ my Saw Traxx jig. Just a circular saw. Same blade it's had in it forever, no clue what it is, but it's nothing special.
 

fbman63

New Member
I have a panel saw and use a blade for cutting aluminium works a treat a bit of baby powder helps it cut clean also use the baby powder when routering acrylic
 

fmg

New Member
I use a Festool ts 55 with the correct blade and a guide rail which comes in an assortment of lengths.1 nice clean pass and then I buff up the edges using a Festool Rotex sander with different grade abrasives.
 
Top