Monday 26 July 2021

Vacuum Forming

In the spirit of pushing a drawing as far as possible, we made molds of two 3D printed figures with vacuum forming at Quelab.


ETHAN'S 3D DRAWING

The best figure was created and 3D printed by Ethan Moses during an Onshape workshop he gave last August 2020.  We vacuum formed it during hack night on July 21st:



An ice cube
cast from the vacuum formed mold



The small vacuum former from Atlas Resell.  Below is the basic set-up:

The basic set up 
before turning on


Adric recommended this video by Adam Savage below:


Adric also adds:
 "P.S. Cheap #6 PS plastic plates* (not foam) work pretty well if you cut the rim off. you can also buy a number of types and thicknesses and colors/clear of thermoplastics. and cut them into 5x5ish.  actually did 3 5x5 pulls side by side as well. "

*cheap plastic picnic plates


MY 3D PRINTED DRAWING

The Wednesday before, on July 14th, we started with one of my drawings (AI collaboration with Pavel Acevedo):






The basic set-up, with the corn starch "mold release":

We lightly dusted the 3D print 
by running my finger over it with Corn Starch,
which served as a mold release


We had to first drill some holes into the 3D print.  Otherwise the vacuum could not pull the hot plastic around the whole figure:

Drilling holes into the 3D print


Clear dental vacuum forming 
see thru plastic sheets

The Process:
  • Insert rectangular plastic sheet in the holder
  • Turn on top heater with red switch at the bottom, raise the plastic towards the heater
  • Heat the plastic so that it droops, about the same distance as the original piece is high
  • Pull the hot plastic sheet and holder down quickly over the object, and flip the vacuum switch

The Process


The see thru vacuum formed mold
next to the 3D printed original


We repeated the process with a different kind of plastic, styrene:

Vacuum forming with styrene


Before "demolding"


Various molds


My drawing was probably too convoluted to begin with, however the process worked.  It would probably look better if we started with a simpler form (perhaps one derived from relief prints).


A decade ago, in 2011, I commissioned someone in Tucson to make a mold from one of my drawings, which I then had cast in chocolate with the Candy Lady in Albuquerque.  He must have used vacuum forming to make the mold:



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