How To Cut Styrofoam At Home

Mechanical cutting scheme for foam

The easiest way is to cut a slab that is not thick, up to 50 mm, using an ordinary, even table knife. For this, the foam plate is placed on the edge of the worktable and a cut is made. The cutting edge of the knife should be as close to the reference plane as possible. Before cutting, the blade must be sharpened and refined with a polishing wheel.

How To Cut Styrofoam At Home

The cut off part of the letter must be supported so that the material does NOT break under load. To cut with maximum quality, the knife is moved with little effort in one direction. “away from you”, the reverse motion of the blade is “idle”. If you have to cut a letter laid out on the table top with a boot knife, then the direction of the application of the force is reversed. “towards yourself”.

It is strongly not recommended to cut thin-sheet foam material in weight or in a vertical position.

It is much easier to cut the foam with a hacksaw for metal. For dense grades, the hacksaw blade Do not change, for highly porous foam sheets, the side surfaces of the blade are ground on a sharpener to remove the gap of the teeth. The hacksaw can cut in almost any position without restrictions.

The most productive tool for cutting sheets is an angle grinder or angle grinder. Depending on the diameter of the cut-off wheel, the angle grinder can cut foam up to 50 mm thick on the fly. In this case, the quality of the cut will be much higher than in the case of using a knife or saw. The disadvantage of this method is the large amount of dust and shavings. If you reduce the cutting speed of the foam to a minimum, the material will begin to burn and melt, which is not always allowed by the cutting conditions.

It is quite simple to cut the foam sheet with a jigsaw. In terms of productivity and cut quality, a jigsaw is inferior to an angle grinder, but it has an invaluable advantage. it can be used to make curly cuts, which are difficult to get by the second method of mechanical cutting.

Technology, how to properly cut a sheet of foam

For home conditions, you can offer several proven methods:

  • With the help of a sharpened shoe or construction knife;
  • A hacksaw for metal with an improved hacksaw blade;
  • Powerful soldering iron with a razor blade attached to the tip;
  • Thermal cutter or hot nichrome spiral;
  • Jigsaw or angle grinder.

If you want to cut the foam with a jigsaw or angle grinder, you should definitely use a respirator and goggles. Foam dust is highly electrified during cutting and adheres with incredible force to the skin of the hands, face, gets into the eyes and lungs.

Thermal methods for cutting foam

The second most common method of cutting foam is a thermal cutter. In fact, this is a nichrome thread, laid on the frame in the form of a frame. When an electric current passes through a nichrome wire, the metal surface heats up and melts the foam. There are several design options for the torch. The simplest one looks like a nichrome string, stretched over a ceramic insulator mounted at the ends of a wooden or metal frame.

With such a tool, you can cut Not only foam sheets, but also wooden slats, plastic pipes, any material with a melting or decomposition temperature of up to 270 ° C.

If you need to cut slabs with a long cut, then it will be more convenient to use a machine in the form of a vertically stretched thread on a PCB support.

LATR or rheostat is used to control the heating of the nichrome string. Excessive surface temperatures can melt and even ignite the foam. A remarkable property of this cutting method is the complete absence of dust and chips, in addition, the cutting surface is melted, as if coated with alkyd varnish.

If only small pieces of the foam block need to be cut during the processing of the foam, for example, when making a sculpture or model, it is best to use a nozzle for a powerful electric soldering iron.

Separately, the most interesting way to cut foam with a laser should be mentioned. Perhaps it will seem fantastic, even at home laser cutting of foam is possible, photo. A conventional 2-5W LED laser allows you to cut the foam sheet at a completely random path.

While such a tool is able to cut paper and foam within 10-15 minutes, so it will be very difficult to achieve large volumes of cutting on it.

How and what to cut styrofoam at home

The widespread availability of massive, full-size foam boards has automatically led to a boom in the use of durable, soft and easy-to-handle material at home. In fact, from thick foam letters it became possible to make a huge number of all kinds of useful things, you just need to find a way how and what to cut the foam in order to prevent deformation, fracture or crumbling of the material.

Why is it difficult to cut foam

The widespread use of foam material was largely constrained by the porous structure, resembling a compressed layer of the smallest polystyrene cells filled with a blowing agent.

If you had to cut foam sheets, then you probably paid attention to the following feature:

  • The denser and heavier the material, the easier it is to cut it with sharpened tools. The thinner the cutting edge, the easier and faster it is to cut even the hardest carbamide foam;
  • Lightweight foam grades are easiest to cut with power tools. The higher the cutting edge speed, the cleaner the cut surface. In industrial conditions, thin foam plates are cut with a thin water jet, with practically no waste;
  • When trying to cut a slab with a sharp blade With a few movements, a situation arises when each new cut increases the amount of foam sawdust and dust almost twice.

Most modelers and craftsmen who professionally work with foam will argue that cutting foam boards is not difficult at all, especially since the density and strength of the schodo material is low. And they will be right. Cutting foam at home is not difficult, you just need to accurately select the mode and equipment for cutting the foam.

The number of options for the practical application and use of foam for those who know how to work with their own hands has long exceeded a hundred. Dozens of different models, injection molds, toys, stucco moldings, decorative elements, insulation, parts of acoustic systems and even refrigerators are made from foam material. The main problem that accompanies any attempts to process the material mechanically is the selection of the mode, how and how to cut the foam so that it does not crumble, as a result, cutting is always accompanied by the formation of a large amount of waste.

If the sharp cutting tool is not sharpened enough or moves at a low speed, when trying to cut the smallest gas-filled balls, the cutting edge does NOT cut them, but slides over the polystyrene foam, crushes and pulls out the foam from the compressed mass. It is possible to cut a foam sheet in this way, but a huge amount of waste is generated.

Cutting the foam with a laser beam is only possible if the white surface of the foam is treated with a black or dark absorbent layer, for example, with ordinary acrylic paint. It would be more rational to install a laser on a machine or a homemade CNC carriage from a router. In this case, it is impossible not only to cut, but also to Form 3D models from thick foam blocks. To get the exact dimensions of the model, the laser must be pulsed.

Thermal methods for cutting foam

The second most common method of cutting foam is a thermal cutter. In fact, this is a nichrome thread, laid on the frame in the form of a frame. When an electric current passes through a nichrome wire, the metal surface heats up and melts the foam. There are several design options for the torch. The simplest one looks like a nichrome string, stretched over a ceramic insulator mounted at the ends of a wooden or metal frame.

With such a tool, you can cut Not only foam sheets, but also wooden slats, plastic pipes, any material with a melting or decomposition temperature of up to 270 ° C.

If you need to cut slabs with a long cut, then it will be more convenient to use a machine in the form of a vertically stretched thread on a PCB support.

LATR or rheostat is used to control the heating of the nichrome string. Excessive surface temperatures can melt and even ignite the foam. A remarkable property of this cutting method is the complete absence of dust and chips, in addition, the cutting surface is melted, as if coated with alkyd varnish.

If only small pieces of the foam block need to be cut during the processing of the foam, for example, when making a sculpture or model, it is best to use a nozzle for a powerful electric soldering iron.

Separately, the most interesting way to cut foam with a laser should be mentioned. Perhaps it will seem fantastic, even at home laser cutting of foam is possible, photo. A conventional 2-5W LED laser allows you to cut the foam sheet at a completely random path.

While such a tool is able to cut paper and foam within 10-15 minutes, so it will be very difficult to achieve large volumes of cutting on it.

Mechanical cutting scheme for foam

The easiest way is to cut a slab that is not thick, up to 50 mm, using an ordinary, even table knife. For this, the foam plate is placed on the edge of the worktable and a cut is made. The cutting edge of the knife should be as close to the reference plane as possible. Before cutting, the blade must be sharpened and refined with a polishing wheel.

The cut off part of the letter must be supported so that the material does NOT break under load. To cut with maximum quality, the knife is moved with little effort in one direction. “away from you”, the reverse motion of the blade is “idle”. If you have to cut a letter laid out on the table top with a boot knife, then the direction of the application of the force is reversed. “towards yourself”.

It is strongly not recommended to cut thin-sheet foam material in weight or in a vertical position.

It is much easier to cut the foam with a hacksaw for metal. For dense grades, the hacksaw blade Do not change, for highly porous foam sheets, the side surfaces of the blade are ground on a sharpener to remove the gap of the teeth. The hacksaw can cut in almost any position without restrictions.

The most productive tool for cutting sheets is an angle grinder or angle grinder. Depending on the diameter of the cut-off wheel, the angle grinder can cut foam up to 50 mm thick on the fly. In this case, the quality of the cut will be much higher than in the case of using a knife or saw. The disadvantage of this method is the large amount of dust and shavings. If you reduce the cutting speed of the foam to a minimum, the material will begin to burn and melt, which is not always allowed by the cutting conditions.

It is quite simple to cut the foam sheet with a jigsaw. In terms of productivity and cut quality, a jigsaw is inferior to an angle grinder, but it has an invaluable advantage. it can be used to make curly cuts, which are difficult to get by the second method of mechanical cutting.

Why is it difficult to cut foam

The widespread use of foam material was largely constrained by the porous structure, resembling a compressed layer of the smallest polystyrene cells filled with a blowing agent.

If you had to cut foam sheets, then you probably paid attention to the following feature:

  • The denser and heavier the material, the easier it is to cut it with sharpened tools. The thinner the cutting edge, the easier and faster it is to cut even the hardest carbamide foam;
  • Lightweight foam grades are easiest to cut with power tools. The higher the cutting edge speed, the cleaner the cut surface. In industrial conditions, thin foam plates are cut with a thin water jet, with practically no waste;
  • When trying to cut a slab with a sharp blade With a few movements, a situation arises when each new cut increases the amount of foam sawdust and dust almost twice.

Most modelers and craftsmen who professionally work with foam will argue that cutting foam boards is not difficult at all, especially since the density and strength of the schodo material is low. And they will be right. Cutting foam at home is not difficult, you just need to accurately select the mode and equipment for cutting the foam.

The number of options for the practical application and use of foam for those who know how to work with their own hands has long exceeded a hundred. Dozens of different models, injection molds, toys, stucco moldings, decorative elements, insulation, parts of acoustic systems and even refrigerators are made from foam material. The main problem that accompanies any attempts to process the material mechanically is the selection of the mode, how and how to cut the foam so that it does not crumble, as a result, cutting is always accompanied by the formation of a large amount of waste.

If the sharp cutting tool is not sharpened enough or moves at a low speed, when trying to cut the smallest gas-filled balls, the cutting edge does NOT cut them, but slides over the polystyrene foam, crushes and pulls out the foam from the compressed mass. It is possible to cut a foam sheet in this way, but a huge amount of waste is generated.

How and what to cut styrofoam at home

The widespread availability of massive, full-size foam boards has automatically led to a boom in the use of durable, soft and easy-to-handle material at home. In fact, from thick foam letters it became possible to make a huge number of all kinds of useful things, you just need to find a way how and what to cut the foam in order to prevent deformation, fracture or crumbling of the material.

Technology, how to properly cut a sheet of foam

For home conditions, you can offer several proven methods:

  • With the help of a sharpened shoe or construction knife;
  • A hacksaw for metal with an improved hacksaw blade;
  • Powerful soldering iron with a razor blade attached to the tip;
  • Thermal cutter or hot nichrome spiral;
  • Jigsaw or angle grinder.

If you want to cut the foam with a jigsaw or angle grinder, you should definitely use a respirator and goggles. Foam dust is highly electrified during cutting and adheres with incredible force to the skin of the hands, face, gets into the eyes and lungs.

Cutting the foam with a laser beam is only possible if the white surface of the foam is treated with a black or dark absorbent layer, for example, with ordinary acrylic paint. It would be more rational to install a laser on a machine or a homemade CNC carriage from a router. In this case, it is impossible not only to cut, but also to Form 3D models from thick foam blocks. To get the exact dimensions of the model, the laser must be pulsed.

How to cut high quality foam at home

Foam boards are widely used as insulation. When arranging thermal insulation in a house, it is often required to cut the material according to the required size. Styrofoam cutting can be done with a variety of tools. But in order to do this smoothly, quickly and efficiently, a special device is required, which, if necessary, can be built with your own hands.

1 Cutting foam

So, polystyrene foam, like any other material, needs to be processed before use. Initially, it is supplied in conventional boards with a certain thickness. However, the shape of the plates is not always enough to use them wherever necessary.

Often the slab has to be cut into pieces, trimmed, cleaned up. Sometimes it becomes necessary to cut the decorative part at the edge of the slab or make a certain angle.

There are actually a lot of options. But the question remains one. How to cut the foam? It would seem, why still invent any additional units, buy a special cutter for foam plastic if it cannot be cut, you can even break it with your own hands. And that’s literally.

Here we must turn to the features of the expanded polystyrene itself and. The foam itself consists of small polystyrene balls.

The initial raw material in it is a polymer that is mixed with a foam filler and air. In total, a rather pliable and very light construction is obtained, which is easy to cut or break by hand.

Just breaking the foam is not the best solution. Kink line will never be accurate. Styrofoam balls will bend it, making the final structure unsuitable for precision work.

However, we still note that it is very easy to break or cut the foam. That is, cutting foam at home is quite real. Another question is how to do this accurately and with minimal material destruction. This is where a foam cutter or any homemade apparatus will come in handy.

Mechanical cutting scheme for foam

The easiest way is to cut a slab that is not thick, up to 50 mm, using an ordinary, even table knife. For this, the foam plate is placed on the edge of the worktable and a cut is made. The cutting edge of the knife should be as close to the reference plane as possible. Before cutting, the blade must be sharpened and refined with a polishing wheel.

The cut off part of the letter must be supported so that the material does NOT break under load. To cut with maximum quality, the knife is moved with little effort in one direction. “away from you”, the reverse motion of the blade is “idle”. If you have to cut a letter laid out on the table top with a boot knife, then the direction of the application of the force is reversed. “towards yourself”.

It is strongly not recommended to cut thin-sheet foam material in weight or in a vertical position.

It is much easier to cut the foam with a hacksaw for metal. For dense grades, the hacksaw blade Do not change, for highly porous foam sheets, the side surfaces of the blade are ground on a sharpener to remove the gap of the teeth. The hacksaw can cut in almost any position without restrictions.

The most productive tool for cutting sheets is an angle grinder or angle grinder. Depending on the diameter of the cut-off wheel, the angle grinder can cut foam up to 50 mm thick on the fly. In this case, the quality of the cut will be much higher than in the case of using a knife or saw. The disadvantage of this method is the large amount of dust and shavings. If you reduce the cutting speed of the foam to a minimum, the material will begin to burn and melt, which is not always allowed by the cutting conditions.

It is quite simple to cut the foam sheet with a jigsaw. In terms of productivity and cut quality, a jigsaw is inferior to an angle grinder, but it has an invaluable advantage. it can be used to make curly cuts, which are difficult to get by the second method of mechanical cutting.

Styrofoam Cutting Angle Grinder

Cutting the polystyrene foam plate can be done with an angle grinder, using a metal disc for this work (you need to choose the thinnest disc).

This type of cutting is NOT efficient and comfortable enough, since the work is accompanied by a lot of noise, and after they are completed, a large amount of debris remains.

Devices and methods for cutting foam

Polyfoam used for insulating various structures of a building has a rather NOT dense structure. The cellular material easily crumbles and breaks under mechanical stress. To ensure smooth cut edges of the thermal insulation product, special devices are used:

  • Stationery knife. This method is the most affordable and simple one and is most often used when working with foam at home. The tool is effective only for cutting small-sized cellular products with a thickness of NOT more than 5 centimeters. The main condition for high-quality cutting with a clerical knife is a new and sharp blade.
  • Thermal knife. This tool is specially designed for processing foam. The knife is capable of instantly heating up to 600 degrees. It is used for products of small thickness. In order to cut the foam sheet, you should smoothly move the tool along the intended mowing line. In the process of melting the material, fairly smooth edges are formed.
  • Hacksaw for wood. Such a device is used when it is necessary to cut a cellular heat-insulating material, the thickness of which exceeds 80 centimeters. A saw is used for work only with fine teeth. With the help of such a tool, you can provide the product with even edges only with a straight cut.

Thermal knife. foam cutter

Builders sometimes use an angle grinder to separate the foam and the desired parts. This uses a disc with a minimum thickness.

On an industrial scale, cutting of porous material is carried out using special CNC machines. The cutting process on machines is carried out by various types of cutting tools:

  • Milling cutter;
  • Sharpened hacksaw blades;
  • Carbide wheels;
  • Laser radiation;
  • Thin nichrome strings.

Most often, the industry uses the option of cutting by means of strings fixed in the required position. Many CNC machines are equipped with a computer program, and the process is controlled remotely.

How can you cut styrofoam at home? Self-made cutter technology

There are many options for constructing effective foam cutters from available tools. Two of them are especially popular. a cutter and a machine with nichrome thread. Each tool is quite simple to use and is able to provide an even and high-quality cutting of cellular material.

Knife cutting

When insulating the floor base or ceiling with foam plates, it is not at all necessary to use special equipment.

To cut polystyrene foam at home, you must have:

  • Good knife.
  • Ruler more than one meter long.
  • Pencil.

The procedure for cutting polystyrene foam boards in this way is quite simple:

  • Preliminarily, on the surface of the material, the points of the beginning and end of the cutting line of the cut are marked with a pencil.
  • Next, a ruler is applied to these marks, clamped, and an incision is carefully made along it with a painting knife (it is not necessary to completely cut off a piece of foam).
  • The expanded polystyrene plate is turned over to the other side, and the cut is made in the same way, parallel to the cut already made.
  • After making the cuts, you just need to break the foam along the mowing line.

This method of cutting material is the cheapest, quietest and fastest, also after the end of the work, practically comments on garbage. Be sure to check the sharpness of the knife before starting cutting the foam.

Homemade machine

A stationary installation for cutting foam plastic allows you to more accurately cut the cellular product according to the planned fishing line. In the process of processing, it is not necessary to make movements with the tool, but simply to move the material itself. You can make a machine yourself.

Homemade foam cutting machine

To make a stationary cutter, you must prepare the following devices:

  • Two long self-tapping screws with wide heads.
  • Nichrome string;
  • Wires for connecting current;
  • Rheostat for adjusting the charge strength;
  • 12 volt step-down transformer.

A table is used as a basis. The support part can be made by yourself. The main condition for its manufacture is the presence of a flat smooth surface. Table sizes are selected arbitrarily.

Applications

For the most part, this material is used as insulation. over, it is used for external and internal work. With the help of polystyrene, many designers create interesting compositions; it is also used for the production of ceiling tiles, baseboards, cornices, stucco moldings and others. This area of ​​application is associated with several main advantages of the material:

  • Environmental friendliness;
  • A light weight;
  • Low price.

All these areas are directly related to the question: “What is the foam cut?”.

You can take a regular office tool. And execute the cut. In this case, the process will be accompanied by a creak, a large amount of debris, the edges may crumble. This option is suitable for light trimming and thin sheets. In this case, you will need to frequently replace the blade.

How is styrofoam cut at home? Foam cutting wire. Facade styrofoam

Polyfoam is a heat-insulating material widely used in individual construction. It is sold in canvases, so it is often required to cut the desired length. Anyone who has come across such materials understands that it is difficult to do it with high quality with ordinary tools. How to cut styrofoam at home? Consider further.

Shaped cutting of foam

Often, designers use expanded polystyrene to create any decors.

Facade styrofoam

This material can be produced in several variations:

  • Pressed;
  • Suspension, uncompressed;
  • Self-extinguishing non-compressed suspension;
  • Extruded polystyrene foam.

The thickness of panels for facade insulation ranges from 70 to 150 mm. You need to understand that such work is accompanied by a large number of cuts. Therefore, the previously listed methods of cutting foam will not be very relevant.

Nichrome wire

As noted earlier, cutting is best done with temperature. Facade styrofoam is NOT an exception. Russian people have always been distinguished by their ingenuity, which helped to come up with equipment for manual cutting. Required:

  • Desktop;
  • Transformer that converts 220 to 12 or 24V;
  • Nichrome wire;
  • Adjustable rheostat;
  • Wires.

The wire for cutting the foam is fixed across the table with a gap for the required size. Wires, rheostat, transformer are connected. When heated, the wire will easily make a high-quality cut. The material should be fed without much pressure, and the heating temperature of the wire is also important. Too high can cause sagging.

Designers also use such a tool in their work. The wire allows you to make a number of curly cuts.

What is Styrofoam?

Full name of the material. Expanded polystyrene. This type of insulation belongs to foamed (cellular) plastic gas-filled masses. If you look at this material, you can see many small balls fastened together. Therefore, during normal cutting, a large amount of fine debris is formed, and the cut itself turns out to be uneven. What is styrofoam cut with? The question is interesting and relevant.

There are two main options for density:

  • Soft. Such layers have a porous structure. When cutting, they crumble strongly, break.
  • Solid. This material is easy to process. Minimally crumbles, the cuts are smoother.

Worth Note that the first option is cheaper than the second.

Thermal cutting with a knife

For this method, you need to think about heating the tool. Open flames or heating equipment can be used. The knife itself must be well sharpened. You need to stock up on a guide straight bar for cutting. It is best to do the work outdoors. This will prevent the accumulation of harmful odors that negatively affect health.

Hacksaw for metal

This type of tool will allow you to cut sheets of any width, but the productivity will be low. Rubbish and creaking will also accompany the entire process. The edges will crumble. This method is suitable for a small number of cuts. Work should be done on a table. The cut-off part is moved from the support structure so that you can work with a hacksaw.

Power tool

How to cut styrofoam at home with a power tool?

  • Electric jigsaw. The process seems to be partially automated, the speed of work will increase. But the quality of the cuts will be low. Again there will be creaking, garbage. At the same time, one must understand: slabs with a thickness of more than 80 mm are unlikely to be cut with such a tool.
  • Angle Grinder. It will also speed up the slicing process. But at the same time the rubbish will scatter in all directions, and even there is a strong noise from the operation of the instrument. If, nevertheless, an angle grinder for cutting is chosen, then it is better to purchase a diamond wheel with a minimum thickness, this will help to raise the quality of the cut.

Separately, it is worth considering a tool such as a soldering iron.