bertram31.com

Carl: Use Yannis's mold and heat the lexan with an overhead radiant heater made using stove heating elements. Hang the heating unit overhead on pulleys so you can raise and lower it. Use three elements and lower the heat on the two outside ones as the plastic bends into the mold. Just a crazy thought for a cheap way to do it.

Rawleigh

It might be easier to buy 3 radiant heaters from a place like BJ's. They go for around $99 a piece. The upside is you can use it later on.

Rawleigh, the adjustable radiant heater is an idea. I was thinking of a cinder block heat box and pump in heat under a diffuser. Or go down the block to my powdercoater n stick in his walk in oven.

I'm still leaning towards no heat and cold bending in place. A bit too much heat the material will craze up in a short time bringing me back to where I started. I can get answers as to what is too much heat...but if oven is off, hot spots...I'd prefer to no have to deal with it. Also looking closer, the bend is not as bad as I originally thought.

Carl,

Why not take your mold to the lexan guy and let him do the necessary?

We do not know everything and it may become expensive to learn by trial and error.
My .02 eurocents.

Why....good question Yannis.

I'm stubborn and pretty sure I can do this at the cost of my time.

Carl

I remember saying that when doing certain projects. It didn't work out that well.

Sometimes it is better to pay the piper.

I agree there are times when it is better to pay than play. I'd have liked to pay for the whole job to be done, but I can't dance to the Piper's tune.
LOL, I'm not exactly sure where I was going there.


But I do know I can bend a piece of plastic to fit in the curved frame. What I do not know yet is exactly how, so I'm working through the options before starting. Trying to lay out a plan so I can change it when I get started.

Carl

I would love to be there to watch you get the curve, but the $1,000 in tolls keeps me from ever going to Staten Island again.

Watch him do the CURVES, not curve

I redid the frames, and had Maritime Plastics in Annapolis do my windows on the Anna E. All of ‘em. Fronts, curved sides, and big flat side windows. I can’t imagine doing the curved sides. Interestingly, they had to recut one of the front opening windows. They used one side as the pattern and cut both windows, and as we know, no 2 windows on a B31 are exactly alike.

If my curved panels don't come out as planned, I'll head your way to have them done.