Solid surface boat sink covers

This is a pair of sink covers I made for my Brother-in-Law's boat. The boat came with a plain white set from the factory but one went overboard so the boat didn't look quite as pretty anymore.

These replacements were made from solid surface counter top material. I V-carved the letters and swirls and then filled them with solid surface adhesive.
It's the first time I've done this and I don't have the proper dispensing gun so I mixed the adhesive by hand.

The things I learned are:
1. The cream hardener sets up REALLY fast. By the time you're done mixing it's almost too late to get it in the work.
2. Mixing by hand adds MANY air bubbles.
3. Bubbles float to the top even in a quickly setting adhesive.
4. The adhesive shrinks a lot so you get a chance to fill the bubble craters.
5. If you mix the adhesive on a piece of nicely printed packaging the adhesive can pull some of the ink out of the packaging.
6. The ink might not show up in your fill job for a couple of months. Go figure.
7. Solid Surfacing cuts beautifully and finishes like a dream.

If you've never worked with Solid Surfacing do yourself a favour and give it a try. I get mine from a counter top friend of mine. I've carved a number of serving trays from it, added some text and some v-carved patterns and gave them to charitable events for silent auction fund raisers. I've also machined some stop blocks from it to use in the T-track slots on the Bot table.

Scott



Attachment 1751

I like these. Clean and practical.

Also, thanks for the solid surfacing tips.

Thanks for sharing your experience. Those look really great. I have wanted to try it - need to look up a local counter top shop.

Hi Joe and Terry,
Thanks for the compliments.
I really like working with solid surface material and am lucky because the guy I met gives it to me for FREE!
If you can get you hands on some you should give it a try. It makes great serving platers.
I'll usually cut a pattern into the border of it and people really like it.

Scott

Scott

I think we would like to see the other items that you make in Corian or whatever brand you use when you get a chance pls.

Thanks, Pete

Scott,
I have found some material. Do you have any feed rate suggestions?

Thanks,
Terry

Terry,
I am fairly new at all of it so I'm by no means an expert but this is what I've been doing:

For V-cuts I think I used 1.7 - 2.0 ips.
For profile cuts going all the way through the material I think I slowed it down to 1.0 ips.
I'm not sure about those numbers though. I'll look them up on my ShopBot computer tonight.

I have been using a 1/4" bit at 1/8" depth of cut per pass for the profile cuts and got quite a bit of 'bit flex'. The bit flex would result in a stepped edge so I now do a 0.010" offset cut and then do a full depth finish pass. I get much better results doing it that way.

Peter, I haven't been ignoring your request. I found a few pictures but they really aren't very good. I'll tidy them up as best I can and post them soon.

Thanks for the interest guys.
I hope to cut some solid surface Christmas presents this week so I'll try to get some decent pictures and post them.

Scott