Subject: Re: : Re: [harryproa] Re: extruded polystyrene core questions
From: "StoneTool owly@ttc-cmc.net [harryproa]" <harryproa@yahoogroups.com.au>
Date: 5/12/2018, 11:07 AM
To: harryproa@yahoogroups.com.au
Reply-to:
harryproa@yahoogroups.com.au

 

From what I've read there is a lot of dispute on this.  In general there is no dispute that polystyrene foams are safe to cut with a hot wire.... the gasses given off stink but are not toxic.   Once one gets away from polystyrenes (EPS and XPS), nobody seems to agree on anything except that polyurethane is extremely toxic, and should never be hot wired.   Some people claim that viny or pvc based foams are safe to cut, others claim that one or the other or both are toxic.  Here's one quote from a post discussing hot wiring divinicell.  It's obviously OPINION only:

There are two other components of decomposition to worry about.  HCl and phosgene. Phosgene is toxic at low concentration.  HCl is irritating at low concentration but not deadly until high concentration.  It would not be worse than pool fuming muriatic acid.

Note that phosgene is a deadly gas that was used during WW1 on troops in France.   Divinicell can be formed three dimensionally using heat, and can be cut easily with various tools.  There is good reason to hot wire XPS, as it isn't the easiest material to work with using regular cutting tools, and generally being 2 pound foam, it is often used in very large blocks that may have been glued together, and are carved to shape with a hot wire.  

Without an authoritative source such as a MDS recommendation, I would personally be reluctant to hot wire cut any foam other than polystyrene.

                                                                                 H.W.





On 05/12/2018 08:00 AM, '.' eruttan@yahoo.com [harryproa] wrote:
 

Well said Doug.

May I ask an few practical questions?

With Divinycell, how do you cut the foam? Is it mostly only knife cut? I ask because it is common to Hotwire XPS. Can one hotwire
Divinycell?

Does one ever cut Divinycell along its thickness? For example cut a 20mm sheet into two 10mm sheets.

If, as noted prior, one can get 12mm sheets cheaper than, say, 6mm sheets, could one just use heavier 12mm sheets generally?
Can you think of where one could not do this?

Thank you Doug.

Of course, if anyone has experience or thoughts on the above, please advise.


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Posted by: StoneTool <owly@ttc-cmc.net>
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