Vacuum Forming is Incredible! FORMART 2 Review
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- Опубликовано: 8 июл 2024
- Vacuum forming opens up a world of new possibilities to makers, but what is it and how can you use it in your projects? In this video we'll check out the FORMART 2 Smart Vacuum Forming Machine and a cheap way to try vacuum forming at home!
FORMART 2 Kickstarter campaign - www.kickstarter.com/projects/...
DIY Vacuum Former Build Video - • Prop: Shop - How to Ma...
TIMESTAMPS:
0:00 Intro
1:05 What is Vacuum Forming?
2:36 Uses for Vacuum Forming
4:09 FORMART 2 Overview
9:34 Testing
14:04 Can you use PLA Forms?
16:54 Pricing
18:54 DIY Alternative
20:10 Safety + Conclusion
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I work in this industry and you're bang on with all the details. Only thing i'd add is i often have to get rid of webbing at sharp points by placing those rectangular shapes they provided (we use self-adhesive neoprene foams), so once webbing is discovered, i place them to form a 90 degree angle with the sharp corner angle where the point of the mold is located. This basically makes the plastic spread out and doesn't let it web together in that area. You should have items 1-1.5 times their height in distance apart. For plastics/molds that require being right on the edge of burning, i use compressed air to spray the plastic the moment it's formed. This keeps it from overheating and burning on the mold. Don't forget you can also cool the molds between shots, but don't do it too fast.
Awesome tips, thanks!
I agree with all of this but the neoprene foam for web catchers. The foam just doesn't hold up with adhesive over time because it is flexible. The foam either bends and stretches pulling on adhesive or gets stuck in the plastic depending on the plastic and amount of vacuum. ruclips.net/video/RC7TeiwL0Bg/видео.html Plus you don't want to use adhesive on that bed. Hard blocks work better and hold up through production much better. You can 3D print them for temp projects or make wood ones with good draft angle. Best cheap option is wood blocks screwed down, but that won't work on this machine unless bolted through bed vent holes. (Ugh, the bed, that is whole other video)
$2000?! Holy moly. We do it ourselves with a toaster oven and a vacuum. I kind of expected this around $499... Great looking machine, but far too expensive for most consumers.
A true vacuum pump is expensive. I'm hoping they come down to about $1K someday. We use a toaster oven setup as well, but you don't get the really crisp details
There's the Mayku FormBox that's is much cheaper
@@originaltrilogy1 $65 new
what are you on?
Adam Savage also has a video on building your own. They're really simple devices if you take out all the fancy electronics and sensors.
@@originaltrilogy1 a vacuum pump isnt expensive. after all its just an air tight sealed pump. a good tank is usually more expensive, but far from $1k.
I love that you received a $2,000 item for free for review and still supply an honest review and even discussed a DIY alternative. We need more honest reviewers like you!
I have literally never encountered a youtuber who doesn't provide honest reviews regardless of if they paid for it or not. I don't know why people always say things like that.
@@cenciende9401 well then you're gullible
@@cenciende9401 LMFAO. I've never met a dishonest used car salesman either. My son says the reality TV shows he likes aren't scripted like the rest of them are. The next girl you're dating is going to tell you she's not like other girls and is actually into sports and drinking beer. Etc, etc, etc. Hilarious.
Could check out the Vaquform or Mayku competitors.
Show me an example where they aren't, it would be highly illogical in multiple respects to not be, in fact I haven't watched/subbed to a single channel with an actual person doing a real review that hasn't been honest
I had good results by heating the plastic over a grill, it supplies heat much faster than the heatgun
Yeah a toaster oven like in the punished prop tutorial is definitely better than heatgun.
I use my oven usually it's the only thing I have for that. I did have some grandiose plans for a custom heater of some sort for a piece far larger (4'x4' or more) but I can't bring myself to do it until I make some progress on the rest of the project first
Sounds tasty.
@@SwiftCreationStudio that doesn't sound too healthy
I have been vacforming in a small shop for about 15 years starting in the 90''s(moved on to other things) and I won't get into most of the details and nitty gritty, but the biggest detail to get right on a DIY build is your vac TANK(not PUMP, TANK). Quality of a pull can frequently come down to how fast you can remove your air. The fastest way is to pump out a tank and use that for you vac.
Hmm, using a tank for a vacuum. Interesting idea.
Exactly. I use a vacuum pump to pull the air out of an 11 gallon air tank, then I have two quartz patio heaters I stripped down to make the heating unit. Pull the plastic over the buck and throw the valve to the tank open. You get some serious detail out of that.
@@robertfousch2703 Just make sure your tank is suitable for the vacuum you want to pull.
Yes and no, in some cases slower is better. On our big machine, I have the valve set mostly shut for some products because a slower draw prevents webbing of plastic in corners.
The way that the plastic conforms so smoothly to the object is pretty satisfying, too bad its a whopping 2,000 dollars.
You can make your own that looks far less fancy and lacks the automation for like 30$ max. And if you can't build it I bought a 12x12 for something like 80$ on ebay so it's not too expensive
they have a small lightweight one for hobbies by "we r memory keepers" its like a scrapbooking company only about 80$. also we use a small version in dentistry for retainers for a mid range model its a few hundred bucks but the work surface is only about 5x5.
I made my own for rc bodies for the cost of a shop vac..
@@smolscale I have like 6 shop vacs in my garage doesn't do me much good without the cost of wood to make one :P
Not too bad of a price compared to a lot of professional equipment
But I can agree the price is well out of reach for a majority of people who would love this stuff for small home businesses
Love the idea of a modular bed size. Great review!
Yeah, modular bed cuts down on waste, I liked that feature. I'd be tempted to save the QR code stickers from the corners of their sheets and then use them to trick the vacuum former into setting the right temp/time for the machine when using 3rd party sheets that are same thickness and type of plastic.
Angus is such an eccentric and charismatic character, makes for one of the best RUclips hosts for this kind of thing in my opinion
But always so afraid of being burned.
@@cda32 he is relatable :D
Not the most modest person in the world that’s for sure.
@@amalirfan I can't really relate, I've burned myself stupidly thousands of times on 3D printers, soldering irons, ovens, cars, bbqs. Have never died. Never heard of anyone dying from a small burn.
RUclips did a good job with recommending me this gem of a channel
What a perfect match vacuum forming and 3D printing is! The last (only) time I did vacuum forming I had to shape a block of wood for the plastic to wrap around, some 32 years ago at school.
3:00 to get that chocolate out easier, pop it in the freezer for a bit, hardens things up and also shrinks chocolate a bit making easier to remove. :)
Is PETG normally food safe?
@@bbowling4979 I believe so, but FDM printed petg will get food stuck in the layers, so you wouldn't want to use food that can go bad and poison you!
@@bbowling4979 petg is used in a ton of food storage containers. It's pretty much the industry standard as far as I can tell.
@@bbowling4979 Usually yeah, some might have additives that might make it not safe but petg is incredibly commin in food packaging and I think is the standard material for plastic bottles.
Holy shit that's CRAZY expensive. $1800 for a wet vac and a toaster oven!
Yeah that's how Kickstarters usually end up. It's going to be better but is it really $1,000+ better?
Watch the Adam Savage video. A few hundred at most to build a perfectly usable former. Under a hundred if you are handy.
thanks now I know how I plan to make one
@@Bigrignohio Mind linking me?
@@SibaNL He rebuilt it here. They are very simple machines. ruclips.net/video/lsXLGT5N2uo/видео.html
Your reviews are always great. Well organized, clear pros and cons, and plenty of great examples. Nice work!
This guy can make anybody excited about whatever he reviews. Wheter 3d printing or vacume forming.
I know all about vacuum forming. As a kid we had a Mattel "Vac-U-Form". A great toy, that a alas with modern toy safety standards don't exist any more. The Mattel "Vac-U-Form" had an exposed heating element. It taught you patience. You had to wait long enough for the plastic to get soft for good forms. You could touch the hot plastic and see how much it flexed while heating up. It also gave you exercise. It had a hand pump. The harder you pumped, the better the form. I think we had the Mattel "Creepy Crawlers' "Vac-U-Maker" version.
Diy is the way to go with these if people have any maker skills. A shopvac has more than enough power for a platform this size, you could pick up small vehicles with a shopvac as long as the surface area is acceptable. Plus a lot of people already have them at home or can easily borrow one or buy one at second hand shops/websites.
With money being tight for many nowadays I think this is the way to go.
What's actually more important than the machine itself, in regards to getting good pulls, is knowing the material glassing point and as mentioned in this video the angles to allow good pulls. The 1st can be looked up online easily, the 2nd can be picked up by practice or asking for pointers on prop/cosplay forums.
For using a 3d print as a buck (master,form, etc) I recommend a thin coating of pu resin, cheap, easy, keeps details and hardy enough for the temperatures used typically though I would use a mask and have proper ventilation but that should be pretty much a prerequisite anytime we use plastics around heat that is higher than ambient temperature.
My council here in Melbourne doesn't even tell which plastic goes into which bin because they know everything goes to landfill anyways. Really infuriating.
The sad part is these two things actually feed off each other. Not telling people which plastics to put where and how to separate leads to them putting everything together, in turn making the entire load essentially unusable because sorting through the stuff on the manufacturing end wastes time that was supposed to be mitigated by the Person sorting it out.
So yeah it all goes to the landfill because they won't and they won't because it all goes to the landfill
The next best option is to reduce plastic waste and changing to products and companies that don't use plastic and only use recycleable packaging, goods etc.
@@telectronix1368 plastic is such a useful thing, we are never getting rid of it, its really magical stuff
@@monad_tcp It damages the land and water environments where it is extracted, where it is used, where it is then dumped.
Plastic is now in our water, in the air, in our food.
It really ain't "magical"
@@telectronix1368 It is magical in maleability, easy of shaping, production, durability, etc.
As a material its almost a magic dream material, its so good.
We are probably keep using it, even if we don't produce it from petrol anymore, because its so useful.
We could use aluminum in its place thou, but aluminum takes tremendous amounts of power to process.
Nothing we do is free of consequences to the environment, we just have to manage it, people always go for all of nothing. That's not how it works.
The fact that plastic is so malleable makes for less use of worse materials that require much more energy.
Also, it can be recycled, its one of the easiest things to recycle.
The material is that good.
People don't recycle because creating more of it is cheaper, make it more costly by taxation.
The polycarbonate demo won me over. Thanks for trying that and fixing the hygroscopic issue for us.
I could take that same $1800 and make a really nice, and much larger vacuum forming machine with money left over. I built one 15 years ago with Harbor Freight and Home Depot parts. The key for a successful DIY former is using a purge tank that you pre-charge with "vacuum" pressure. The 11 gallon air tank from HF is perfect for this application, and so is their vacuum pump. The hardest part was drilling thousand tiny holes by hand in my upside down sheet metal baking tray, and wiring up the heater coil, snaked around in such a way for smooth even heat. I used a baking tray for that part too.
20+ years ago I worked in a sign shop and we had a giant vacuform oven that I recall pulling countless Dairy Queen signs off of. It would pull 1/4 inch thick lexan over a 12 food long DQ form. We'd then clean them up and cut them before sending them on to paint.
highly detailed video with a friendly and warm spirit
Thank You so much
Very cool! Thx for sharing!
"Succ boi 5000" oh my god
Lmfao 😂
Your highschool nickname? 🤪😜😝
Very well explained
I will try making this machine
Stupid thought but "Pla smoothing with a vacuum former"
Could a terrible homemade vacuum former make for a good pla smoother?
RUclips many make there Own cheep look it up
Excellent presentation!!! I love the way you clearly explain things in detail and anticipate questions from your viewers. I would add that if you want to make a DIY system, you can find nice perforated metal sheet for the vacuum bed from a microwave oven door which can be salvaged from a discarded oven. Cheers!
I made a semi automated vacuum forming machine years ago (video on my channel). I trialed many heating elements... and found that taking apart cheap $20 toasters from my local hardware store worked the best. You can just bend the nichrome wire and leave the mica panels in place and you have heating panels... play around with the setup to get even heat distribution. Not going to pass certification but it works! Then I used a stepper motor to drive the platform with the mold on it into the clamped piece of plastic that was heated. An Arduino controlled the timing and the stepper motor. The platform was on acme rods to achieve linear motion. Worked great and made many pulls with it. Still works to this day.
Interesting that you can use a smaller area, addresses one of my concerns with making one: that the size you make is the size you have every time.
I'd never spend that much on one of these, I'd diy it, but it's cool to see this kind of thing starting to show up more. (And hey, remember, even Adam Savage uses a diy vacuum forming machine with a shop vac guts.)
That "fill your pla with plaster" idea is much better sounding than the water soak.
Australia DID have plastic waste recycling 20 years ago. A local bloke built a plastic recycling plant here in Port Pirie, South Australia using his own engineering. (I machined some of the larger parts for his plant at a local workshop) He invented the process for making black plastic garden stakes from unsorted plastic waste.
That plant was shutdown about the time we started exporting our plastic waste overseas. The overseas market for that waste has since disappeared but the local plastic recycling plant is gone
I love how you consider everything. This is awesome
i built one when i was about 13 and i loved it back then
Great video Angus! I will show this to my students whenever I have to explain what they can and cannot do with our vacuum form machine :)
Awesome review and than you for trying different material
This is great, I want one.
If you build or get a machine with an A5 sized area, HDPE milk bottles work well. You can get a A5 sheet from a 2l bottle, and the best part is that it goes from miky coloured to clear when it's at the right temperature! There are some quirks with it, but it works really well for something that is free.
Because milk bottles are blowformed the plastic is pre-streched so as you heat it, it pulls taunt as it tries to recover and works well for a plastic.
Great for food grade chocolate molding. We've used this for several rotomolded chocolate workshops at the Fabrication Lab.
Oh.. And when tempering chocolate, look up the sous vide method, it works SO well..
Love the idea of recycling the milk bottles too! I'll check out this sous vide method...
Liking the haircut Angus
Feels much lighter haha, but will grow back instantly as usual!
@@MakersMuse Showoff! :D
@@MakersMuse I thought you'd added a new person to the channel for a second. The voice is unmistakable though.
It is hard to get crisp looking pulls without a decent vacuum pump. On the down side, I was making some vacuformed face shields with a homemade shopvac setup and it was working almost ok, so I found a place that had a professional setup, and gave them my bucks which were made of 3d printed parts and wood and cardboard. When they tried to use them, they just crushed into a crumpled mess. The idea of filling the 3d prints with plaster is good, I have done that and it works well (and saves a huge amount of time if you can print it in vase mode). One thing that can't be overstated is that to get smooth pulls, you need to have a absolutely perfectly smooth buck.
What I do is print hollow PLA bucks, and fill them with cheap canned expanding foam instead of relying on infill. Then I vac-form a sheet of 3mm eva craft foam over the raw PLA print, it smooths and hides the layer lines and adds a nice "release" layer between the print and the PETG sheet, then I vacuum form the clear plastic and get pretty smooth clear pulls with no visible layer lines or blemishes.
So far its worked pretty well!
I want to put this idea out there because I'll probably never realize it and this is the perfect video for me to express this.
We should make cooling ducts for 3d printers via vacuum forming. It's super lightweight, smooth walls makes for better airflow, it's super cheap and fast. There's also money to be made (i assume people would be interested.).
Good course & nice review video!
I ran an old large format vacuum former that made scenery for television and movies. I also trained on a "thermoformer" from Columbus-Tech by the guy who built it. The wrinkles in a sharp corners are the most common problem I ran into. Put on some heat-resistant gloves and you can try to work those wrinkles out by hand while the vacuum is still going. The other thing I learned is that you can place pieces of MDF both underneath your form to raise it up a little off your bed, as well as placing blocks around it to help alleviate the stress. I see you did that but I used to use lots of them. almost like making a frame of lego blocks around the form.
@Maker's Muse, my daughter and I have had a lot of fun using a syringe full of chocolate chips and an immersion circulator to inject chocolate into silicone molds without having to worry about it setting up right because we never break the temper thanks to the precisely controlled water temperature. An immersion circulator is a great tool to have even if you don't cook much, I'm sure you'd find many uses for one. 👍
Cool to watch, my Design Technology GCSE had us make vacuum formed and card packaging for products, with the idea we designing it to be sold.
Vacuum forming fascinates me. But I don't have a use for it. Great video! A nice change of pace!
A vacuum former is still on my list, but I'll probably go for the DIY version to see whether I'd actually make use of it. Thanks for sharing!
Bring on Maker's Muse in the kitchen! I'm looking forward to seeing the next video!!
Amazing
19:20 - Kudos for the shop safety sandles.
If they aren't thongs then it's appropriate workshop footwear.
Hi. I backed the campaign and it was successful the production unit works as advertised.
People are talking about the plastic and the machine and the price, and I'm just over here waiting patiently for Angus to release his chocolate tempering attempt. The agony will be delicious.
I found your video very informative and useful, thank you. The one area I would like to see covered in the future is the cost of consumables, like the plastic sheets. Cheers!
That is so cool. I first saw a vacuum machine in an old video by Tested where Adam Savage explain what it is, what it does, and how it works. It seems like it is one of those machines that really work in harmony with 3D printing. Especially for things like prop making, replicas of various things, and cosplay. It's a shame the pricetag is so high that it prohibits most cosplayers and makers to have a their own machine. Hopefully maker spaces, schools and open shops will get this or similar vacuum formers installed.
This channel is so great. I have 0 interest in 3D printing, vacuum forming, laser cutting, etc. anything myself, but I still love to watch this channel to know what is going on in the marked of 3D printing.
Great video as always
Interesting new concept.
I've seen PUnished Props Academy, and seen there space helmet doom. Fantastic YT channel
Thanks for sharing your knowledge to all of us👍😀
Old as heck in the industry envarement
Finally someone made a video about Vacuum Forming + 3D printing. Finally i know the answer. Thanks man.
And the problem with recyclables plastic is that, the more thinner and dirty (mixed with other materials) the plastik is, the less can be recycled. And those thing thin sheets of plastic could be one of them.
Thank you, you answered all the I've ever had. I want to mold monster clay. Not sure it's going to hold up. Maybe I'll try clear coating first...
Angus is one of the few people who can make me fully engrossed during a 20 minute review for a product that I’m not interested in and will never buy
Very interesting.
It is possible to create templates from PLA
You have to pay attention to two things
1 50% Infill
2 Perform healing to the PLA templates .
I created molds for an industrial device in PLA for models before production
bless you for the combat robotics shoutout
I'm seriously considering getting a vacuum pump to do bag forming carbon fiber stuff, making good use of a pump to make molds work be a great bonus and alternative to 3D printing.
Sweet! Vaccum form smoothing! 15:11
I actually remember in college we had a pretty old vacuumer and I needed to use styrofoam as my master and I did use the "soaking the piece on water" hack and it actually worked using a HIPS sheet
The formart looks great, the modular bed is an excellent idea but the wobbly frame seems like a pretty important flaw that I hope they fix, also the cost seems extremly high, even if it has a bunch of neat features
The ability to use smaller sheet is the key feature.
The only way to do that on a DIY vacuum former is to just make multiple machines.
No, it'd be quite possible to replicate the functionality, it would just have to be designed in from the start. That sections of the heating element can be switched off, and sections of the vacuum bed blocked off.
@@NirateGoel Has it correct, people have to stop copying skin packaging machines and then it is possible to have one machine for most work.
Nice review Angus. Very thorough and informative. It is easy to balk at the $1800 price point if one only considers it a hobby machine. The things you were most critical of are things that are easy to address and fix. Especially in pre production. The results speak for themselves. Naomi Wu's demonstration of the machine also proved it works well. The results are impressive enough that with some creative thought (like your prop shop knob example of scaling up from a 1-up mold to a 10-up mold) this can be quite the money maker. There is a lot of merit to a plug and play solution for the end user. Not having to fiddle with settings makes it easier for the user to focus on production. I am a maker at heart and would rather build than buy but sometimes my time is worth more than what the build may consume. Do you see any issues, based on your experience, of scanning the QR codes and printing them on stickers to place on my own sheets? I would use the same material and thickness that they do but I'm sure I could source material much cheaper. Besides not having to buy their consumables, it would also keep me from having to manually set / use the custom settings which then means anyone (employee, student, etc) could use it with virtually no experience (think temp employee, student, etc). Thanks.
Thanks for making a point about material waste.
Hi I was thinking about getting a resin 3D printer but my budget is not high what printer would you recommend?
Also do you know a good website to find SLA files or other files?
It is so easy to build one yourself. I never thought about buying one. Only if you need bigger format sheets plus a large output of pulls, you have to buy an industrial size machine.
I have always wanted a vacuum former
Wow! That polycarbonate pull is amazing!
"Dehumififying" Love it.
My brother heated plastic sheets with several IR flood lamps. Relatively safe heat but the cycle time was 15 minutes or so. He also used a shop vac.
I wish you had stared with the price. I could have skipped out on the rest of the video. At least it was a Makers Muse video, so I got something from it.
Yeah sorry figured people would hit up the campaign while watching.
I never had any intention of ever buying a vacuum forming machine. But that doesn't mean I have no interest in learning about one because I'm not a dumbass, knowledge is power.
Hey! You combed your hair! Looks great! Thanks for the review.
In the past I have printed pla bucks and then coated them in bondo or epoxy(depending on the application) with great success. Lets you print rough(fast) and still have a nice looking result
You could get one of these as a toy in the USA in the early 1960s for about twenty bucks. Called Vac-U-Form and was made by Mattel. Identical in every way except for the price and the size. I had several of them over the years. Made cases for my electronics projects.
Does anyone know if I could pour hot wax for lost wax casting into a mold done this way? Would it be able to withstand over 200 degrees wax?
Just want it to put my two cents... What you can do to make moulds/masters using 3D printed part.. You can use bog, a thin layer to make really smooth and using sand paper to smooth it out... You get really get good finish also use dry mould release spray for better release.
The wrinkles that you are getting on some moulds in the corner is called WEBBING... There is a number of things that you can do to get rid off them... Mould placement is vital to get a good mould, delay the vac for a couple of sec once placing the sheet of plastic, when the draw is too big you might need to get material into those tight places before putting the van on, etc.
PLEASE HELP ME!!!! i bought a ender 3 pro and it arrived fine i built it and tuned it but when printing usually in the middle of my prints there's a HUGE layer skip like the printer nozzle will go up 5mm and down 1mm and continue printing so when the prints are done it sometimes falls in half ;(
Re: not knowing what you're doing in the kitchen - I think Ann Reardon (How to Cook That) is in Sydney. Maybe do a collab?
She's my main source of info for chocolate haha
@@MakersMuse Hope you didn't lose your..... temper! :P
@@BRUXXUS -___________________-
I backed this, and I’m happy to get Angus’s take on it. I have a Makyu right now, but I’d like to do larger stuff.
What do you use yours for?
@@originaltrilogy1 Elementary school Makerspace. We created sugar skull molds for Day of the Dead and we will be using them to make chocolate bunny molds for Easter.
For chocolate, you should try to sous-vide it, removes a huge part of the skill/randomness of the process.
There's always the solution to try to keep a water bath at a constant temp and use a ziplock bag for those without the equipment required
I'm actually pretty interested in the idea of smoothing PLA prints this way!
I made a 20” square vacuum former for like $100 in parts and an old Dyson vacuum that had a busted ball hinge that was destined for the trash heap. $100 vs $2000 for a machine that looks to be about 1/3 the size. Granted the pulls look cleaner than I managed to get out of mine, probably due to my inexperience with vacuum forming, but I’d rather have more cleanup time than spend 20x as much on a premade one.
Polycarbonate looks fantastic! Great video
Bro, just seen you video about wheels. For sand, try making something like scoops. Imagine spoons. I can't use 3d printing software. Maybe a round base with long square flaps that sit out of the wheel. If you look up sandrail tires, you'll see that they have scoops that have something like pockets in them. The reason why I commented this here, is because it is your latest video. I don't know about you, but people usually check comments on their latest.
Timing on vacuum forming is everything, heat times, cool times, then to hit the vacuum, when to release it from the mold, it all matters Id want that functionality, thats why most even larger industrious ones are still mostly user controlled, set by time.
Yeah 智慧真空成型機.
Hello from Taiwan!
I've got that green dental one. It works pretty good. Got it for about US$100.
Finally! :D
Nice flame job Angus...
In 1960 I was 8 and one of my friends had a Mattel Vac-u-form. It was 4" x 4" and I can remember going through a pack of 100 sheets on a Saturday afternoon. You had to pump a handle for the vaccuum. That thing was hotter than hell and we burnt the carp out of ourselves. We both ended up with bandaids on our fingers. But it was worth all the pain. 😂🤣Sadly you could never sell anything like that for kids today. ☹️
I had one. Nifty toy! Didn't cost $2K, either.
Been doing pla moulds for my vaquform with 6mm top layers and 3mm walls and high infill and done good 20 pulls with 0.75mm petg so can def be done
and it smooths your prints :)
In the Uk at least Vac formers are plentiful, Mainly aimed at the school Design and Technology curriculum. They vary in size and the design and technology suppliers are a good source of suitable sheet plastic. You have to consider how to cut the shape out of the sheet and also the cost of the plastic sheet material. A handy machine but of limited use for the hobbyist.
Angus! You gotta have a look at the project "Precious plastic", now called "One Army" and you will never bin the scrap plastic pieces. :)
Chocolate maker coins sound good, tank's for you beginners tutorials Angus!
Pro tip, if you want to fill a part with plaster, use gyroid infill since all the empty space is connected.
If you think that could be dangerous check out the Mattel Vac-U-Form. One of the most popular toys we had back in the 60s. It was marketed to children.
Great video! How about making plaster molds from your 3D prints? Plaster, when dried out is letting air through, thus eliminating the need for holes (unless you use dentists' plaster). It's also cheap and old model-making textbooks apparently mention it as well (at least if you want to do only 3-5 pulls or so)...
They should keep the magnetic holds, but put a cam lever on both sides that you squeeze to pop the top bed away from the magnets so it is less awkward.
Vacuum forming as a method of smoothing and finishing PLA prints.... interesting idea, lol!