Something I started a while back. I made a vacuum form set up useing an old space heater and vacuum pump from a car. This set up worked well enough but i quickly ran into a few issues and I am now remaking the system from scratch to adress those issues.
The first set up was simple enough. Two boxes that joined together to make a "suitcase", but that could be taken apart to use the two halfs. Kind of like how old typewriters used to come set up with a "suitcase" cover on them (No, im not THAT old, but we had some old stuff around my house when I was a kid).
The heater box was very simple. A space heat removed from its original houseing with a removable extention to hold the plastic over the heat in its frame.
The vacuum box was a simple 18"x12" table covered in foam rubber for a good seal when the heated plastic was placed over the slug to form the plastic. Inside the box was a 4" diameter by 12" long tank that was pumped down to 18hg by use of a car vacuum pump. A lot of cars in the 80's and 90's used these pumps to work valves for climate control systems. A ball valve was used to release the vacuum and suck out the air at high preasure and PULL the palstic around the slug. The tank was there to give a good initial pull while the pump once again would work down the preasure till the plastic cooled.
The set up worked well enough but there where a few problems I ran into.
In my haste to build my set up a number of areas of
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