Just thought I would share a small update with you all regarding Pololu.
They have a laser cutting service for cutting acrylic / plexi and such and I find it to be a reasonable price.
Here are some details at a glance:
More details can be found here: https://www.pololu.com/product/749Laser cutting pricing: Approximately $2.50 per minute of laser cutting time.
No set-up fees, $25 minimum charge per panel going into the machine
For larger jobs, we can offer you a quote for a lower cost per minute
Shipping costs start at only $5.00, and you can select shipping methods from USPS or FedEx.
Laser Cutting Materials and Capabilities:
We can laser cut various thicknesses of plastics, woods, paper, cloth, and more. We can also cut thin metals (up to 0.060" stainless and spring steel). We can cut parts up to 47.5″ × 47.5″. We stock acrylic, ABS, Delrin®, styrene, and some woods, and we can quickly obtain many plastics from local suppliers. You can also ship us your materials.
We cannot laser thick metals, PVC, polycarbonate (Lexan), or carbon fiber.
At the moment, I am planning on using the 4" hull package from BlueRobotics, and I plan on custom designing my end caps.
The end caps at BlueRobotics Retail for $16 - 26 USD each. I submitted a quote to Pololu for a total of 5 pieces of custom end caps, cut from 12mm clear cast acrylic, and the total quote was around $75.
That works out to roughly $15 USD each.
My design looks something like this: Blue lines will be cut, red lines will be vector etched.
The dimensions shown in this file are the dimensions of the drawing; the actual part sizes will
likely vary by around ±0.01", and they cannot promise any particular tolerance. Note that the
laser also cuts at a slight taper (probably around 1-2 degrees).
Just thought I would share this for the good of the group.
Happy Diving,
Ryan
"KR2_Diving"