Thanks murph. You should have seen my first few attempts at bending.
Materials are: acrylic, blow torch, several strait edges, some spring clamps and a portable work bench.
The workbench gives you a nice flat surface and something that is easy to clamp to if you need an extra hand.
Its not really that hard, once you get the hang of heating it evenly. I use a blow torch (works well for 1/8", but is harder to manage with thicker stuff). The trick is to keep the torch moving fast enough not to overheat.
The material is 1/8" acrylic. When its that thin, it is easier and very fast (maybe 2 minutes) to heat.
I score the plastic lightly along the bend line so I know where to heat and bend. always score on the inside of the bend otherwise you will have a gap open up along the score line.
With a torch, you need to make sure to heat from both sides. It the acrylic gets quite soft when its ready to bend. It is easiest to lay part of the plastic flat on the bench and bend downward.
If you want a tight bend, you need to use a flat piece of something (ruler, piece of wood...) to push the acrylic flat against the side of the bench. This is where clamps and a square come in handy. You need one hand to hold the ruler and one for the square so you get close to a 90 degree bend.
For the bend that conforms to the shape of the back of the TV, I bent it in place so that it exactly matched the shape of the TV.
I did the same thing for the part that hooks in place, but it took me several tries to get it right.
The nice thing about bending acrylic is that, because it heats to a rubbery consitancy rather than melting, you can easily undo mistakes. Just heat the bend, lay it flat and press something flat on top of it to keep it striat until it cools.
There are a couple of bends there that I did more than once or even moved a little, but you can't tell unless you look closely.
It took me about 3 hours start to finish to make this one.
For around $40 you can buy a heater strip thats made specifically for bending acrylic. That would probably make things easier for me since I could then clamp one side of the piece down and bend it in place. But hey, I get more man points for using a torch!
