Hi everybody,
I have an interesting problem. I have been, successfully, thermoforming .020" PETG sheets into a honeycomb pattern (see pics). Recently, I have discovered that .020" is too heavy for my application. .010" will work perfectly. The problem is, nobody stocks .010" PETG so I must move over to, say, .010" PC. Ok, no problem except, PETG seems to be much more forgiving and easy to form than PC. So, long and short of it is, I have been using a WARD press with heated platens and pressing the PETG with male and a female dies. I used the heat from the top platen to get the PETG hot enough to form then I pressed it. It worked great with PETG. Now, with PC, it doesn't get it hot enough to press. It seems I need to move to a UV light and vacuum table. I am not sure, however, if vacuum will be enough to draw the PC down into the holes to the bottom. In a 5/16" hole, it will need to draw the plastic down 3/8". I am curious of any of your thoughts. I am new to thermoforming and I don't want to go through building the table only for it not to work. I mean, maybe pressure forming will work better but Im not even sure where to start with building a pressure former that can form a 1'x2' sheet. Any thoughts will be greatly appreciated. Thank you so much for your time.
Sincerely,
-Connor