MAKE | Make: Projects – Hinge-Technique Acrylic Box Construction Using a Router

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By Sean Michael Ragan
Posted 2011/09/30 @ 4:25 pm
Category Craft

Recently, I posted about German firm Serrox Technischer Handel’s video showing an interesting alternative to the basic slab-joint method for building an acrylic box. Their technique, which involves cutting 90-degree V-grooves almost all the way through the plastic, has much to recommend it over the slab-joint method, with the exception that they use a very expensive custom V-shaped sawblade to cut the grooves. I wondered, at the time, whether it might not work just or almost as well with a cheap 90-degree V-groove router bit, and with some encouragement from Angus Hines, I decided to try it, myself.

The short version? It works. Here’s how I did it.

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BY Sean Michael Ragan

I am descended from 5,000 generations of tool-using primates. Also, I went to college and stuff. I write for MAKE, serve as Technical Editor for MAKE magazine, and develop original DIY content for Make: Projects.

In the Maker Shed

0 Responses to Make: Projects – Hinge-Technique Acrylic Box Construction Using a Router

Bradley Gawthrop on October 1st, 2011 at 2:53 am said:

There is some debate about this, but nobody who has ever seen a rotary tool like a router grab a glove and pull it, hand and all, into the cutting edge of a tool (which it can) ever uses gloves with rotating shaft power tools again. Something to consider…

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- Sean Michael Ragan on October 1st, 2011 at 2:24 pm said:
  
  Yeah, I’ve heard that argument. Especially with bench grinders. Unlike a grindstone or a wire wheel, however, that sharp carbide router point it not going to grab: It’s going to cut. I’d rather it cut the glove before it cuts my hand.
  
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Halfvast Conspirator on October 1st, 2011 at 2:50 pm said:

I was going to make the same exact comment about the glove and the router table. Having been bit by the table saw (once, I learn fast) I realize skin is lot easier to cut than tough leather or whatever that stuff your gloves are made of. The glove is much more likely to be grabbed and pulled (and wrapped around rotating bits) than your finger or other part of your appendage, and other things are going to get bit. Either way, it won’t end well, but I would seriously consider losing the gloves.

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- Halfvast Conspirator on October 1st, 2011 at 2:51 pm said:
  
  Oh, and I forgot to say, “I like your writeup!”
  
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- Halfvast Conspirator on October 1st, 2011 at 2:51 pm said:
  
  Oh, and I forgot to say, “I like your writeup!”
  
  Reply ↓