Advice for cutting acrylic sheet

[Hillbilly52]

Hi,

I'm having real problems machining acrylic sheet, i've been routing 3 & 4mm thick A4 acrylic sheet, and am really struggling to hold it down securely, whatever I do the sheet gets pulled up by the bit ( i've been using 3 and 4mm end mills), i've even tried using a vacuum table unsuccesfully. I'm doing shallow cuts less than 1.5 mm and slow feed rates.

Any suggestions would be appreciated as at the moment i'm wasting a lot of acrylic.

Cheers

Alan

[A_Camera]

Double sided tape is the solution but make sure it is removable. Also high spindle rpm so that the cutter is cutting and not digging and pushing forward, pulling the sheet up.

[Chaz]

Look at NYC CNC's superglue vid on Youtube. Im using that for alu and it works well.

[cropwell]

Single flute cutter (preferably an open architecture one), high rpm, compressed air to clear the chips and water spray to keep the cutter cool and stop clagnuts.

Double sided tape is the easiest hold down solution, and if you can cut a pocket in the sacrificial board to fit the acrylic in it stops it moving sideways.

[Toddy]

If i cut acrylic i use a straight single fluted bit,it seems to work well and throw chips out the groove better

[Ger21]

I cut 3mm acrylic with a 1.5mm single flute spiral, using double faced tape.