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OT Bending Glass or Plexiglass

adh2000

Titanium
Joined
Dec 21, 2005
Location
Waukesha, WI
I have a Victorian era building with a turret on the corner which has about a 12 foot diameter and several windows. The windows were originally curved glass, over the years they broke and someone replaced them with 1/16 plexiglass which they just bent by hand and tacked in place. In this climate that has been a totally unsatisfactory repair and I need to do something better. I got a bid to put curved glass back in the sash but the cost is prohibitive. How would I go about bending 1/8 or 3/16 plexiglass? Can I just heat it with a hair dryer and bend it? Do I need a form? Anyone have a source for curved glass?

Alan
 
I have successfully bent 1/8" plexiglass using a heat gun but this was a small project and it didn't require that it be able to see undistorted images.I think you could do this but IMHO you would have to build a "buck" to the final shape and demintions required.Lay the appropriate size piece of plexi on the buck and heat it with a heat gun until the desired shape is made.Of course there's more to it than this simple explanation but this just gives you an idea of what's involved.
 
One method of bending glass is putting it on a plaster form in a furnace and heating to the point of softening the glass, letting gravity form it, known as slumping. One could rig up a temporary oven to do it.

Plexiglas can be formed by hanging it in an oven until flexible, then wrapping it over a form. For what I presume is a simple curve, an easy way to make a form is to saw wood boards to the desired curve and tack sheet metal over them. The metal is then covered with felt to avoid "markoff" on the plex. To make only a few pieces, just have enough helpers to hold the plex horizontal from all sides and lay it on the form, gently pulling the edges down, but not stretching it. Once I participated in a club built airplane where we taped sheet metal in place of the windshield and formed the plex over that. We heated it in a makeshift wood oven that was only a few inches deep, with the height and width a little larger than the plex. We clipped the plex in it with so called binder clips like you use on papers at the top and let it hang. The door was just a plywood sheet with nails stuck in holes around it, no hinges, and we just moved it out of the way, picked up the plex and wrapped it. We got it wrong the first time, so we hung it in the oven until it straightened out and got it right. Plexiglas has a memory, so reheating it let it return to the original flat sheet. You should have a larger sheet than the final size and trim it to size after bending, eliminating irregularities from holding it.

Bill
 
I have bent a lot of plexi, and using an oven, probably 300 to 400 degrees, works pretty well, then clamping over a wooden form, and trimming it after it cools. Too hot, and you get bubbles. too cold, and it breaks. Take the brown paper off first, or it can melt to the plastic, and make a big mess.

Glass is a bit tougher- its not hard to get it hot, although it needs to be a LOT hotter than plexiglas- its the cooling down thats the killer.
Commercial glass shops use PLC controlled annealing kilns to slowly bring the glass down to room temp- sometimes as slow as 100 degrees per hour.
Glass blowers I know have these things running all the time, and some larger more complicated pieces are in em for days.

Otherwise, the glass will crack as it cools too fast.

Leave glass to pros.
 
If you are looking for curved glass there was an atique mall in Rockford,IL on state street that has numerous different sizes with different radiuses. It would be well worth your time to check it out.
 
You can bend plexiglass by running over it with a flame to shrink it, much like you can with steel, obviously the torch needs to be a soft flame and you have to keep it moving and not get it too hot, or it'll bubble, I've done up to 1/4" this way for the doors in our rally cars.
 
Slump or radius glass

What you are looking for is refered to as "slump glass" or "radius glass". Van Dykes Restorers, a large supplier of restoration hardware carries some stock sizes and can order custom sizes also. Prices seem reasonable. Their web site is: www.vandykes.com

-Tom
 








 
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