Question is would PVA adhesive glue perspex sheet to wood at all, slightly or well?
I am designing my own variation on a beehive that has an inspection window. The hive boxes are softwood, glued with PVA for it's safe non-toxic nature. I want to use 3mm perspex for the pane and I want to glue and screw it in in such a way that it enhances the structure of the box. Unlike for example a loose piece of glass which would require wood and joints all round it to support it.
TW
No it won't work. I don't know if there is a glue that will, but an attempt to put a window into a shed door failed. I ended up with some wood and some bolts through te sandwich. Brian
Hot glue gun type glue seems to work. We had a technician made some acrylic covers for some equipment and at the time we had no solvent glue in stock so as a temporary measure he used a glue gun which eventually became permanent and were still holding together years later after both he and I retired. This was inside so i cannot vouch for the effects of weather.
Richard
Another method that works is to replace one wood slat with a perspex one. The plastic is relatively floppy, screws in oversize holes sorts that.
NT
wot slats?
Bathroom sealant worked when I was making an incubator and I wanted to see what was happening.
Jonathan
Yeah! the 3mm acrylic is rubbish. I broke two of the three pieces just drilling and screwing it!
TW
For plastic work, I like these. Countersink bits.
To drill a hole in plastic, start with one of the smaller bits you've got. Say a 1/16th inch regular HSS. Drills tend to skate on plastic, and a smaller drill bit might stay put. That's your pilot hole, for anti-skate.
Then, using your first countersink bit, "ream" out the hole. Stop before you get to the desired diameter. If you try to advance the bit too fast, it heats up and fills the cutting part with molten plastic.
I made LED lights for the bicycle, and the light was a light array. To mount the array, I used perspex sheet and drilled 48 holes in it (a bag of LEDs...). The holes are perfect and didn't crack the plastic. But it did take a while to drill the 12 x 4 matrix.
Regular drill bits, they catch in the work and crack it. That's how I ruined the first one.
And no matter what kind of drill bit you use, they tend to clog with molten plastic and then need cleaning. You're constantly cleaning the blasted things.
I don't have a whole set of countersink bits, just two bought individually, so I lack a nice selection for easy work. I can't go all the way up through the drill index sizes that way, because my set isn't complete.
Once you're close to the correct size, you'll still need a regular drill bit to make the hole the same diameter all the way through. Which may or may not be important, depending on what you're doing. At the larger bit sizes, the regular bit can still catch in the work and crack it. Even with a very nice pilot hole to guide it, there's still a risk.
And polycarbonate ? Try drilling a CD first, and maybe that'll save you buying a sheet of the stuff somewhere. See if you like it.
If you drill a deep enough hole in plastic, it will "pull off to the side". If tapping a hole and attempting to place a bolt in the freshly tapped hole, you may notice "shit, the bolt is binding". Attempts to run the tap through again, still find the bolt binding. This happens because your hole actually zings off square. And the bolt going into the threaded hole, the hole is crooked so the bolt binds.
The end result is, for a tapped hole, tap to a depth of one inch, and use half inch bolts (in other words, use only half of the threaded portion, the half that still runs true).
I use #2 SS bolts and buy perspex thick enough to use them. I can make screw-together boxes out of perspex that way.
The machinist made beautiful slabs for gluing, and his work is so nice, you could make an aquarium without screws. Just using subtractive glue and his nicely milled edges was enough. That's how my low pressure laser cavity was made (ran at 1 torr). My technique here is bad enough, that would never work. That's why I just screw them together and they're not watertight.
Paul
Why do people make life so hard for themselves. Use a very small abrasive stone in a dremel to melt your way through & there's no risk of cracking, unless you do something stupid.
NT
Drilling Acrylic requires a drill point about 60deg compared to the standard 118deg of a standard twist drill and the drill should have what?s called a slow spiral flute.
Richard
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