On 6 Jul 2006 13:03:21 -0700, wrote:

Hi,



My current project involves putting a 12"x16" acrylic windows on a
piece of particle board. The acrylic window is .220" thick and I need
it to sit flush in the particle board (the board is 3/4" thick). I
want to cut a hole in the particle board which is smaller then the
window allowing for a 1" lip on all sides. I then want to lower the
lips by at least .220".

I'm not a woodworking expert and don't have any experience with
particle board (unless it comes in an Ikea box, anyway) so you can
take this advice with a grain of salt.

The fact that you want the plexi to be flush suggests that appearance
is an important factor in your project. I wonder if particle board is
really the right material for the job. It's pretty ugly unless it's
faced with something. I'm guessing it won't "machine" that well
either. I'll leave ti to someone else to tell you how clean the edges
would come out with a router, but you'd still have to square up the
corners of the routed area by hand (or round off the corners of the
plexi to the radius of the router bit).

I think that a redesign of your project that allows for some sort of
edge covering will make your life a lot easier. If you can accept
something that's not completely flush you could get some metal strip
material say 1" or more wide and 1/8" thick for a "frame". You could
then cut your hole to the size of the plexi (plus a hair for ease of
insertion). screw the edging in around the hole, overlapping it enough
to hold the plexi, and even silicone the plexi to the metal from the
back side. Thus the plexi would be flush with the wood, but the metal
frame would protrude 1/8".

Greg Guarino