[Mike Nawrot]

Originally Posted by s_forbes

This is interesting, where did you get your fiberglass from? The stuff we use drills and cuts very cleanly, and I've never experienced any irritation from it (though I think some team members found it to be itchy). We get ours from creative pultrusions, http://www.creativepultrusions.com/ )

I've looked into creative pultrusions before, and I attempted to convince the superiors to order from them, but it was easier to order from mcmaster just because of the account we've had established there for years now. It's of notably lower quality, which might be the cause of the splitting effects we experienced. It still cut and machined quite cleanly and easily, but when we had too much radial force on some of the holes it basically destroyed itself. This was partially the material, and partially because of the location of the holes on the tube. That said, those problems would not have occurred with a metal of any sort. So really, the point I'm trying to make (in a rather roundabout way ) is to remember that fiberglass is just different from aluminum, and to design accordingly.

As for feeling the irritating effects of the fiberglass dust.. Everybody is different. People with thicker skin don't seem to have problems with it. I wish I could say the same for myself. Haha