Cutting holes in acrylic bath

Sep 10, 2007 11 Replies

Hi



I have to cut tap holes in a new acrylic bath and I'm wondering what the best tool would be. I was planning to use a holesaw but I'm worried about the acrylic cracking/splitting or generally getting chewed up. Are acrylic baths easy to cut?



Any recommendations?



Thanks


Hole saw is the best way usually. A decent bimetal holesaw should leave a nice clean edge. Most taps etc will have a flange that covers the cut edge anyway, so there is no need for it to be perfect.

Just take time to mark out the cut positions first!

When I worked at Ideal Standard, a bog standard holesaw was used (at a medium speed on an airline), but a variable speed drill will be ok, just adjust speed to suit.

Don

I did it a few months ago, just used a bog standard hole drill from one of those packs of 300 drill bit type things, I drilled a pilot hole first to get the distance exact.

Your best bet it to practice loads of times on the old bath, its much easier drilling your brand new bath when you have just done 20 holes in the old one.

Steve

I did mine with a holesaw. I did measure about half a dozen times before I did it, though.

When cutting acrylic, it is important that tools are razor sharp, and you cut slowly enough to avoid melting - a holesaw should be fine. To avoid edge chips on breakthrough, start drilling on one side, then swap sides.

-Just make sure you don't knacker your hole saw doing all those practice cuts :-)

It's not that hard just carefully measure up and go for it.

What if it's cast iron?

MBQ

Then your tupperware won't be sealing as well in the future

Steve

Thanks for all the useful advice, a holesaw and steady hand it is then...

Cheers

I drilled pilot holes into some thin ply first, checked on their distance, clamped the ply to the bath and used that as a guide, so that there was no way the drill could wander or anything. Simon.

I did it recently when I bought a new bath .Measured and measured again .I then used a holesaw I got from Screwfix same or similar to this

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a pilot drill in a quick change arbor
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covered the area with masking tape and marked the exact spot to drill and it went through like butter .

Stuart

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