SCORE!

[slappyhooper]

So I work at a plastic manufacturing company, and one of the many products we make are black laminates which we sell to a well known furniture manufacturer.


 These rolls are massive....64" wide and over 1500 yards long.  Every roll that comes off the line has to be trimmed down. Normally we throw away these cutoffs, but my line leader let me take some home.... I didn't get greedy, but even the cutoffs are about 7' long and still 64" wide. The bonus is that this film is UV resistant, very scratch resistant, and very strong so it should hold up very well.

I'm pretty sure that these are normally fused to the wood products with a ton of heat and pressure, but I'm gonna give these a go with just a heat gun and some patience and see what becomes of it.

This COULD be a relatively inexpensive way to laminate stuff. I don't know what my company actually sells these rolls for, but from what my co-workers tell me, they're relatively inexpensive to what you can find online.

The downside? My company only sells these in large rolls like you just saw....

Very early in the game, but I'm gonna experiment with my scraps and find out what these rolls sell for. It's really, really hard to find good quality laminates that are wide enough, tough  enough and won't break the bank.

[BadMouth]

Awesome!  Back in the 90's I was into the car audio thing and people would bring me large pieces of mdf scrap from a furniture company and fiberglass resin/hardner from a bathtub company.  Whenever I asked for more, I got more.  I had no idea materials were so expensive until I had to start paying for them. 
Those were the days.

I used to work in a factory warehouse and loved my job.  It was relocated to Mexico and I went back to school.
Now I'm stuck at a desk and miserable.  I protest by spending all day on BYOAC.

[RandyT]

I'm pretty sure that these are normally fused to the wood products with a ton of heat and pressure, but I'm gonna give these a go with just a heat gun and some patience and see what becomes of it.
bank.

Very nice! Does this stuff have some sort of heat activated adhesive on one side, or is it designed to fuse to the substrate when heated?  If the former, try a good hot iron with an old sheet in-between.   Otherwise, a can of 3M spray adhesive might be all you would need to get this laid down permanently.

[Gray_Area]

If it works, you might talk to your honcho about selling the scraps in the arcade hobby and stuff. I can't imagine they would say no to money from loose ends......and you might get a bonus.

[slappyhooper]

That's just the thing. They already sell the scrap for pennies on the dollar. They can't sell the cutoffs, so those just get scrapped.
The thing about the manufacturer QC is that any rolls which aren't PERFECT in every way, including thickness are scrap. They regrind some, but there's still a ton of waste built into the business model.


Side note, heat gun method didn't work.
 next up will be testing the 3m spray method.
I have a feeling that will work very well.

[Gray_Area]

That's just the thing. They already sell the scrap for pennies on the dollar. They can't sell the cutoffs, so those just get scrapped.
The thing about the manufacturer QC is that any rolls which aren't PERFECT in every way, including thickness are scrap.

It's called Blem stock.

[slappyhooper]

Since it's been a while, I figured I'd update you all with the latest from my free work laminate pieces.

As you may recall, When I last updated, I had attempted to use a heat gun to thermally bond the laminate to a piece of MDF. Unfortunately that method failed. I believe it failed because I was unable to apply the heat evenly enough to achieve any kind of consistency.

Since my wife vetoed using an iron, I figured I'd test the alternate method: 3M adhesive.

The test piece. The MDF is stock in every way except it has been cleaned for excess sawdust.



I sprayed the 3m adhesive to both the MDF and the back side of the laminate and waited a few seconds for the spray to tack up.

I then hand pressed and smoothed the laminate onto the MDF. The results weren't absolutely perfect since I didn't achieve perfect even smoothness on my application of the 3M Spray.



As you can see here, it still looks pretty good from a 3/4 profile view, but when viewed closer some minor imperfections can be seen depending on how the light strikes the board. In an effort to show these imperfections, I turned off the flash and cranked up the ISO on my camera. There's more grain on the pictures, but it's easier to see the actual results.


So here's my thoughts of the film with 3M spray affixing it to MDF.

1. If the MDF is perfectly smooth and defect free, and the 3M spray is evenly distributed, Then I believe better results are possible. As it sits, the results fall into the "meh" category. 

2.  As I suspected originally, this film is most likely fused to composite boards with tons of heat and pressure at an exact temperature/pressure per square inch setting in order to achieve the high quality results that is associated with melamine type sheets.  Using the 3M spray, decent results are achieved, and this board looks fine for the most part, but this still feels like a laminate sitting atop a board. It doesn't feel "fused" to the board like melamine panels typically do.

Final thoughts:

My testing was completely informal, I didn't pay a ton of attention to detail, and it shows.  I wanted to test this like I believe 90% of people who would use this laminate would apply it.

Regardless, my feeling is that this film, while decent in many regards is not suitable for anything which receives a high degree of abuse such as a control panel. In this respect it's very similar to vinyl.

I'm confident that much better results can be achieved by somebody who takes a few minutes to work out every tiny air bubble as the film is applied. Those horizontal stripes you see on the film showed up on this film are a manufacturing defect which aren't visible in film that ships to customers. Some scrap is indistinguishable to the naked eye from the final product, some scrap has noticeable defects.  You get what you pay for. Questions? hit me up!

Any questions about this? I'm more than happy to answer!

[404]

stuff seems thinner and more pliable than i thought it was.

Maybe you can apply it more smoothly by using a foam roller and some contact cement. That might solve your lump issues.

[darkSSide]

You might want to use a sound deadener roller like this one http://www.streetsideauto.com/p/dynamat-10007/?utm_source=googlepepla&utm_medium=adword&utm_content=pla&gclid=CI6V9vbP_rcCFQ9eQgodnVMAHA