Drilling Acrylic

[gpraceman]

I'm drilling holes in some 0.093" thick acrylic and wondering just how many layers that I can stack to make the work go faster? I've been doing 5 at a time now problem, just wondering if there was some rule of thumb on maximum thickness. The hole sizes are from 1/8" to 1/4".

[cpcp]

No "rules" that I know of. The only thing I watch depends on on the cleanliness you require of the hole walls. The deeper the stack the more you tend to get a hot bit combined with molten acrylic; this can have the dual effect of giving rough wall finishes and injecting molten acrylic between the sheets causing them to bond or have raised surfaces about the hole.

As usual specific blade angles and 'pecking' helps significantly.

[gpraceman]

Wall finish isn't an issue. These are just screw holes. I am using drill bits specific to plastics. I have done some testing with peck drilling and that looks to be working out. I'll probably stick with 5 pieces high for now.