Routing Plastic Material For Moulding Profiles

[norms@uswest.net]

I am in the market for a CNC machine. So far, the ShopBot seems to meet our needs. Our primary products are custom moldings. The tracing templates we now use to grind the molding knives are made by a local tool company from our drawings or a wood sample. Being able to do this in our shop would be a time saver and give us more flexibility with our customers. The question I have, is a ShopBot accurate enough to manufacture a molding profile pattern made from plastic material like Lexan? Some of these profile patterns can get awful busy with combinations of concave/convex radius. The tool company that currently makes these for me uses a $10,000 small CNC router that is dedicated to this type of work. They use a 9MM bit for cutting.Would servo motors be a better choice then steppers? I really would appreciate some feedback. Maybe someone is using a ShopBot for this type of work.

[danhamm@abccom.bc.ca]

Yes, I make moulding templates both with my laser and with the shopbot, the small mouldings are about the size of a floppy 3 1/2 disc we charge
$5.00 a piece. the large copy templates 3 to 5 ft long we make with the shopbot the very few inside
corners, we cut with a 1/8 bit,if there is a tight
inside corner you can cut short and finish with
a tri. file.. and yes lexan is the material of choice.

[edp@sunbeach.net]

I make templates for my profile grinder from lexan using the Shopbot - It has all the accuracy you will need.