3" Acrylic blanks for turning Angels????

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Dale Seipp

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Aug 24, 2009
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Portland, Oregon
I have turned angels out of wood in the past, but wanted to turn some in varied colors of acrylic. Has anyone ever done this? Do I need to pour my own blanks? Are there blanks out there for this?

If I pour my own blanks, can I do in in PVC. Someone with experience... I need help or suggestions. Would appreciate your comments.

Pastor Dale
 
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Dale,

Yes we have done it in PVC. Never very successfully.

Either it cracks due to heat or it won't come out of the mold, depending on the amount of catalyst.

I can get 3" rods from Europe, but they are ridiculously expensive. To use as thin pieces might be ok, PM me if you get desperate!!
 
Dale Seipp said:
I have turned angels out of wood in the past, but wanted to turn some in varied colors of acrylic. Has anyone ever done this? Do I need to pour my own blanks? Are there blanks out there for this?

If I pour my own blanks, can I do in in PVC. Someone with experience... I need help or suggestions. Would appreciate your comments.

Pastor Dale
Click to expand...

I'm still a newbie and am curious, how do you turn an angel???
 
You can cast 3"+ with S41. You just have cut back on your catalyst into the 50%-75% of volume range.

I don't know so much about the turning out the hollow of the "skirt" part if you are talking about the same turned angel ornaments as I remember. You would need to keep an ultra sharp tool or sharpen often.
 
I use PVC moulds all the time for my coffee bean blanks. I use slightly longer than a Sierra sized tube, so I do need 2 for a normal pen. I slit the tube on the bandsaw, then seal the bottom and sides with tape (plastic gaffa type). After the cast has set, I remove the tape, then tap the joint from the top with a small screwdriver spliting the mould away from the cast. Then I just push the cast with a rod and it pops out easily from the mould.
 
Well first, it's not acrylic it's either a PER resin or a PUR resin that you would be using.

Second, Glass scratcher is correct in that you would reduce your catalyst due to the exotherm of the setting resin. If you don't reduce your catalyst content you will get a smoking hot piece of very fragile resin.

Or you could just buy 3" dia clear acrylic rod from delvies plastics or one of the other suppliers.
 
Try cooking a 3" thick pour in the oven at 180* for 6 hours or so. Let cool a week. (Not kidding). I've done a couple of big pours as an experiment, and that was the only way to get it to work.
 
I've done a PR "softball" sized cast that I then turned into a Thistle as the top
of a Keg Tap. It can be done, but you're talking about $10 in resin per blank if you make a solid blank. Other than reducing the catalyst, I didn't do anything special. (OK, I did, but that was because of the 6 color pour that included a clear core and numbers,not because of the resin overheating).

I'd suggest making some kind of mold that gets you closer to the final shape,
then cast into that. It'll reduce the cost of the blanks by a lot and also reduce the problems of heat.

If you do cast a solid blank, as everyone else said cut the catalyst by half or more.
 
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