How to bend
Styrene Sheet
How to bend curves in styrene or plastic for scale models
Sharing buttons:
[Music]
g'day and welcome today's one a workshop
today I'm in the kitchen and not the
workshop and I'm gonna show you how to
bend styrene so about this curve of
styrene here and this piece here and I
want this piece to go like that to
follow the curve of the top piece of
styrene and it's just not gonna win
right there's no way I can clamp there
and then convex curve no way I can clamp
that no I can use rubber bands clothes
aids nothing so what I'm going to do
instead is Bend this piece so that it
stays like that and then it's gonna be
much much easier to stick to this piece
so the trick is you need to put it in
boiling water which is why I'm in the
kitchen so I've just bought my kettle
got a couple of ramekins and some tongs
here's my boiling hot water and I'm
gonna pop this guy in there to just
soften up a little bit don't burn
yourself whatever you do so ya pop it in
there to soften up a little bit and then
once it's soft I'm gonna put it into
this other ramekin which is roughly
around the right sort of size right
diameter for what I'm after and have it
sort of conformed to the interior curve
of that ramekin so you know I give it
about a minute or so depends on the
thickness of the styrene much thinner
styrene will get soft and Bend much more
readily than thick styrene but yeah yeah
what's that been about 45 seconds to a
minute let's fish it out and give it a
try
like I said before don't burn yourself
let's see how give it a tiny bit longer
mmm fascinating video you guys can sit
here and watch the steam rise yeah okay
this is not the most interesting bit but
it's a really cool technique so you can
use them on flat styrene you can use it
on rust styrene any kind of starring you
need it to bend this is the way you do
it and hold the shape basically so if
you try and Bend styrene otherwise it'll
snap on you or it will you know
temporarily Bend and it'll just spring
back to well it's originally mold of
ours it's got a pretty strong memory
this stuff you know let's try that pop
it in King if you had some kind of
tricky way so that's it in there if you
have something a tricky way of keeping
it in that space great you have you had
another ramekin to put in on top of it
or something to hold it in there
probably a really good idea but for you
guys so you can actually see I'm trying
not to do that today and it doesn't take
more for it to cool down and stay anyway
and look it's not going to be perfect
to that shape once I take it out once
it's cooled it's taken out it will
spring back flat a tiny bit but it's
going to be much much easier not quite
doing much much easier once it's got
that bend in it then without right so
I'm gonna do this again heat up some
more water sometimes you have to do this
sometimes it just takes a bit you know a
couple of turns do it again and show you
in a ticks lead I have to sit here and
watch the water steam okay that's been
in freshly steamed water but freshly
boiled water for about two minutes let's
take it out I was also thinking I might
try a small radius thing to put it into
to try and keep its curve so let's see
how we go again burn yourself it's
pretty flexible pop this guy yeah that's
probably better actually because there's
no way can really um spring from that or
isn't that one it was kind of I'm
springing itself does that make sense
yeah there was nothing holding it in
place so that doesn't look like the same
radius as that but once it comes out
what's all nice and cool down
once it comes out it's going to spring
back to shape a little bit and I reckon
we're gonna end up about there let's see
I'll leave it to cool down and here we
are once it's cooled down so it's
definitely sprung out further than what
I expected from that regular swing that
bigger than what it was but that is
gonna hold on pretty nicely for me once
I glue that in it'll take its shake
fairly easily yeah I'll glue it together
and show you what I mean and he is the
finished result
so it's stuck really nicely onto that
curved piece that I needed it to stick
to there's no way I could have done that
and all I've done is I've used some CA
glue put a little bit on the edge there
stuck it down there waited 30 seconds
for that to dry stuff a bit more on
their push the other side in waited 30
seconds to dry that's it there's no
bracing or anything on the back just a
bit of glue that I've glued in there to
keep it holding it and yeah it's worked
a treat some other examples this piece
here I bent a piece of styrene rod so
that was a long straight piece I wanted
to go into this little black socket so
bent it and it's worked another piece
that I have is this piece of styrene
that's bent on the front here so done
exactly the same thing heated it up in
boiling water and it's kept its shape
now for five months that's how long it's
taking me to build this thing but yeah
it's working really well
and one final piece is this little bent
piece on the top here so this piece just
here yeah flat piece of styrene
petered it up holds its shape forever
now I hope that's been helpful to you
it's a really easy Technic and it gets
you out of a lot of scrapes this would
have been just a nightmare to try and do
otherwise it would sprung out at least
wanted it to even if the glue would have
held it wouldn't have held for a long
time and come back to shape but now it's
gonna stay like that for me
and it's not gonna give me any grief um
if you have any questions give me a yell
otherwise I hope this has been helpful
to you and I'll see you next time on
Dave's model workshop
cheers guys
[Music]
