Rout(ing) to Success

Towards the end of last week I began to play with the idea of different materials for the step stool. The reason being, if a wood step stool were to be in a bathroom and got wet it would begin to rot and get gross. I came up with using a polycarbonate plastic material. I began by creating only the top step for practice with the routing machine and the new material. While the routing machine was cutting through the plastic, and no fan attached, shards of cut plastic built up a large pile on top of the piece. This pile made it so when the bit moved through, it heated up and a lot of the shredded plastic stuck to the step and also forced the router to shut down. After having this experience I am going ahead to attach a fan or blower to the routing bit so when the next cut is underway, no plastic melts to the step.