I got my money on 2nd practice round.
We cut poly on our laser cutter all the time. We have even used it for wheels in the distant past also cut by the laser. It does require some serious deburring operations and the smell takes a while to get used to.
I thought I’ve read polycarb is dangerous to laser cut, due to toxic gasses produced? Can anyone confirm or deny?
The laser bed we use has fume removal built in.
1075 used plexiglas on our 2003 electrical board. We had to remake that board several times, and the competition robot had chunks missing from where it had cracked and we couldn’t fix it.
Never again have we used it. We switched to some super-thin aluminum sheeting (in the neighborhood of 0.008", IIRC) for our electrical panels since then.
??? Aluminum foil???
Also, why not use polycarb? You won’t short stuff out by drilling into it, and you can mount your crio directly to the polycarbonate which can then be directly attached to the frame without any additional insulation.
Most teams I’ve worked with use plywood to mount electonics . . .
There is a drill for plastics that has a steeper angle at the tip. I have no recommendation but you could try here for at least the claim of flawless holes in plastics.
Polycarbonate is what my team uses every year now. It worked fine for us and saves plenty of weight.
A small, benchtop laser cutter found in many schools would be unable to do this - only huge ones in plastic shops.
Its not aluminum foil. Its actually fairly rigid, and its significantly lighter than polycarb. We punch all the holes needed into this sheet, and ziptie most things (speed controllers especially) to it. Makes changing dead speed controllers a breeze, not having to deal with the tiny but long #6 screws. Cut two zip ties, and undo five wires.
We’ve been happy with it, but you’re right, when the cRIO came out, we had to be a little careful with the shorting it to ground issue, and I think we DID use polycarb in 2010 IIRC.
We use light aluminum perf stock and mount most everything with wire ties. Makes changing stuff a snap.
Same here, thin aluminum perf. Bend the edges down and it is very sturdy.
May I suggest that you could turn the plexiglass into your own clipboard used for the strategy planning during the game?
-Josh
So far, so good. No failures yet, despite a few battle scars. The brand of the stuff is “Optix” by Plaskolite, Inc.
One test 1178 did in 2010 on Plexiglass (to see if we should use it to protect our bot from the balls) was to attach a piece to two chairs, and kick a ball at it (while everyone was far back and wearing safety glasses). The piece shattered on impact, telling us what not to use.