Birth of Man Mixing Board

Step 5 Bend

Now is the time to bend your case into shape. Put on your heat resistant work gloves (unlike unsafe me).

Lay your acrylic flat on your aluminum or heat resistant tabletop. Measure so that your acrylic is sticking 2 1/4" over the edge of the table and the two holes for the potentiometer and headphone jack are near you. Place a sheet of the paper over your painting (as to protect it), but make sure it will be out of the way of the heat gun (you will be heating the joint where the acrylic meets the edge of the table). Place the plywood over top of the acrylic and clamp it in place. Heat the acrylic along the join where it is clamped and once you see it start to droop a little, try bending it forward. If it is pliable, bend it to roughly 80 degrees and hold it in place until it starts to hold its own shape.

Next measure 5 1/8" and repeat the process. This time bend the acrylic a full 90 degrees.

Repeat it once more measuring only an inch and bend it away from you another 90 degrees.

Comments

[Swishercutter]

I had to bend some acrylic a couple weeks ago for a cover to my equipment rack (maybe I will do a writeup later), I found it makes a cleaner bend if you use some metal yardsticks clamped to the side being bent down (not that you didn't, I had a much longer bend to make). I used a heatgun as well, 3 metal yardsticks, 2 clamps and 3 sets of vice grips. In my first attempt I bent the acrylic exactly as you did but it warped a bit in the middle and was not even (since I was making a hinged door it was not acceptable) second attempt with the yardsticks worked as expected.