Hi there!
We (preciousplasticvienna) are experimenting quite some time now making 300x300x2mm sheets (you can check our instagram for pictures) and now we want to produce bigger plates. (500x500x10mm)
Since that size doesn’t fit our bought 38x38cm sheet press, we will build one ourselves!
The press should:
– produce ~520x520x10mm sheets so that cou can cut off the edges to get 500x500mm output
– have both sides heated so we won’t have to turn it around
– have an exchangeable mold so we don’t have to wait hours inbetween producing plates
– be time efficient (30 mins per sheet at max. would be great!)
– consume at max. 3kW so we don’t need an extra plug (not the most important thing but would be great)
– not cost more than 500€ to build
my drawings: On the first you can see the rough overall design. There will be a carjack mounted on the bottom to build up the desired pressure. It presses together the two heated sides of the press.
On the upper right of the second picture you can see my idea of the heating. the small circles are short rings of a metal tube that are welded onto the base plate. Onto these rings wwe want to mount the heating coils that are used for injection and extrusion too. We are well aware this is not the most energy-efficient design, however it is the most doable and budget-friendly one we could find. We will compensate that with using good insulation.
On the third picture on top you can see the guiding of the heated moveable plate, we are not so sure whether we really want to include this since it is a big source of problems because of the small tolerance.
On the bottom right of picture #3 you can see the cross section of the mold for the sheet and on the bottom left holes in the base of the mold in order to get the sheet out after molding.
We will begin shopping for parts shortly and are happy about any feedback/ideas/suggestions etc.!
All the best
Flo