I want to make Doors for my CNC enclosure and I’m considering ether acrylic or PET. PET would be more rugged but I don’t know if I can cut it.
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From the EPA’s Material Safety Data Sheet …
“Can burn in a fire creating dense toxic fumes.”
I’d say cutting PET in any laser is inadvisable.
I guess I’ll stick to acrylic since that’s easy to work with. It looks like I’ll have to wait until Tarkin is back on-line.
Dorian will cut acrylic.
There’s no reason to wait for Tarkin is you’re curtting acrylic … Dorian does that just fine.
I don’t know where you’d get a sheet of PET- it’s uncommon and doesn’t have great selling points.
IMHO the choice should be between acrylic and polycarbonate. Given that you mention “rugged”, you want polycarbonate. It’s MUCH tougher than acrylic. Shop safety glasses are made from polycarbonate.
Polycarbonate is cheap. You can buy expensive rectangles from Lowes/Home Depot, but you will get a much better deal from Regal Plastics. If you’re in the hardware store, you might browse just to hold it and get a feel for what thickness will be necessary.
Polycarbonate CANNOT be laser cut. It blackens and cracks and you’ll never get an acceptable cut-through. It’s best to CNC it, but it cuts fine on a bandsaw, table saw, any sort of saw and drills easily.
Perhaps you meant PETG?
FEATURES
- PETG is more impact resistant than acrylic and easier to thermoform than polycarbonate
- It die cuts and punches with ease and bonds, fastens, welds and rivets extremely well
- It can be painted, decorated, hot stamped, silk screened, fabricated and formed
- Forming temperatures range from 250°F - 320°F
- Work temperatures range from -40°F to 150°F