Thermal insulating structures are assembled from modern polystyrene foam, decorative elements are cut out and produced a large number of other things.

Its scope of application is very wide. And not in last resort due to the fact that this material is easy to process, it is quickly laid and can be cut with your own hands.

However, you also need to be able to cut foam plastic with your own hands. After all, to get a really high-quality cut and final detail, you need to try hard. Note that it is not dangerous.

1 Cutting foam

So, polystyrene foam, like any other material, needs to be processed before use. It is initially supplied to conventional slabs with a certain thickness. However, the shape of the slabs is not always sufficient to use them wherever necessary.

Often the slab has to be cut into pieces, trimmed, and cleaned. Sometimes it becomes necessary to cut off a decorative part at the edge of the slab or make a certain angle.

There are actually a lot of options. But one question remains. How to cut foam? It would seem, why else invent some additional units, buy a special cutter for foam plastic if you can not only cut it, you can even break it with your own hands. And this is literally true.

Here we need to turn to the features of polystyrene foam itself and. The foam itself consists of small polystyrene balls.

The initial raw material in it is a polymer that is mixed with foam fillers and air. The result is quite pliable and very lightweight design, which is easily cut or broken by hand.

But breaking foam plastic is not The best decision. Your break line will never be accurate. The polystyrene foam balls will distort it, making the final structure unsuitable for precision work.

However, we still note that it is very easy to break or cut foam. That is, cutting foam plastic at home is quite possible. Another question is how to do this accurately and with minimal destruction of the material. This is where a foam cutter or any homemade device will come in handy.

2 Cutting tools

The foam cutting tool may have different designs. It depends on the design and type of cutting how exactly the foam cutter will cope with its tasks.

Cutters are:

• Mechanical on ;
• Thermal.

A mechanical cutter is used to be able to carry out relatively small work in cramped conditions. You can cut the body of polystyrene foam with a mechanical device. But the quality of the cut that ends up may not be what we would like.

Thermal cutter for foam plastic is already professional equipment. It is used by builders, designers and other similar professionals.

The thermal cutter quickly makes holes or cuts lines in any type of polystyrene foam. Starting from regular and ending with extruded high-density foam.

The thermal apparatus basically uses a hot filament or wire.

Based on the type of assembly, the machine for cutting polystyrene foam can be divided into:

• Branded designs;
• Homemade samples.

In the first case, we are dealing with units that were created at the factory. They were specially designed and conceived to give a person maximum productivity and convenience while working.

Branded models include both specialized foam knives and large thermal cutters or other professional equipment.

For example, the same laser cutting foam plastic is possible only through the use of low-power factory lasers, which are controlled by a computer. They are expensive, bulky and quite complex, but as a result of working with them you will get almost perfect cutting.

2.1 Mechanical cutting

Mechanical cutting is performed with tools that are based on the force of mechanical action or friction.

These include:

• Knives;
• Bulgarians;
• Jigsaws;
• Saws.

Most often, such equipment is used at home. When you don’t have the opportunity to buy a thermal cutter, and don’t have the desire. Let's not forget that a high-quality thermal cutter can be quite expensive.

And it’s not always worth buying it, especially if you just need to cut a couple of polystyrene foam boards for thermal insulation with your own hands.

The easiest way to cut foam is to take a regular knife, especially if the foam is cut into. A utility knife with a medium-hard blade is ideal. With its help, you can cut a slab up to 6-8 cm thick without any problems. Moreover, the slab will be cut with high quality, especially if you already have at least basic experience.

But grinders and jigsaws, if they can be used, should be used very carefully. Here you need to understand that a strong torque has too serious an effect on the weak structure of polystyrene foam. If you do not guess correctly with the torque and the choice of disk, you can ruin the stove with your own hands.

The recommendations here can only be general. It is advisable to buy special equipment for cutting foam. If you don’t have anything like that on hand, then at least try to find the thinnest disc for an angle grinder or a jigsaw blade. The thinner it is, the better.

In general, you need to be careful with saws. It is better not to use a regular saw for foam plastic. Unless you don't need cutting precision at all. But in this case it is easier to simply break it.

If you buy a special saw, then the conversation is different. But in any case, you need to be very careful, since the saw, due to the uneven force, has a greater chance of seriously damaging the material.

2.2 Thermal cutting

For thermal cutting, a thermal cutter is always used. Thermal cutter is a special unit for cutting polystyrene foam, it costs almost the same as.

It consists of only a few parts. The main part is the working transformer, which supplies voltage. The transformer may have batteries, or it may be powered directly from the network. It all depends on the specific model.

There are two arcs or mounts extending from the mini-transformer. These arcs are essentially the body of the working element. A special thread is tied to each end of the arc. Nichrome is most often used. The thread is stretched between the ends of the arc so as to form a tightly taut wire.

When the transformer is turned on, it supplies electricity to the arcs, which, in turn, heat up the filament itself.

The hot thread cuts through foam without any problems in any position and any size. After all, the polymer is extremely unstable, and it interacts very poorly with high temperatures.

The big advantage of a thermal cutter is that it gives you the opportunity to work with filigree precision. More precisely, cutting can only be done with lasers. And even then, if we exclude the human factor.

Nichrome heated to a serious temperature cuts foam like a knife cuts hot butter. Moreover, it doesn’t even really touch the stove, meaning you don’t have to apply any physical pressure. Why is this convenient? Yes, because putting in physical effort is always fraught with the possibility of making a mistake.

If all the work is done by a heated wire, which melts the foam rather than cutting it, then the chance of making a mistake becomes minimal.

2.3 Homemade thermal cutter

Clever radio technicians have probably already thought that the design of a thermal cutter is very simple, which means that it can be assembled with your own hands. Indeed, you can assemble a thermal cutter without any problems.

Your main task will be to select a small transformer for cutting and similar products. Well, this is actually not such a problem. You can take a transformer from a TV or convert it from a working sample.

Next you need to assemble an analogue of the arcs. The simplest such mechanism is to attach two long screws to a wooden plank. The tree will not allow them to conduct electricity among themselves, so the only conductor will remain a nichrome stretched thread.

The thread is pulled between the heads of the screws. Then all that remains is to connect the transformer to the screws, then turn on the electricity and adjust the voltage.

It is advisable not to overdo it with voltage and clearly understand that there is a certain correlation between the thickness of the nichrome thread and the operating voltage at the output.

Too much high voltage the thread will heat red hot, and in this position it will simply burn out the polystyrene foam without even touching it. As a result, you will not be able to cut smoothly.

2.4 An example of creating a homemade thermal cutter for polystyrene foam (video)

When working with polystyrene foam, almost each of us has at least once encountered the problem of cutting a sheet of foam plastic at home into certain parts. The most common option is breaking, but this method will not allow you to achieve an even edge and accurate dimensions.

In addition, when a break occurs, a huge amount of debris remains in the form of balls of material, which are practically uncontrollable, since they quickly stick to all the objects around us. Therefore, in this article we will look at options and methods for the best way to cut polystyrene foam so that it does not crumble, without excess debris and to the exact dimensions.

Properties and characteristics of foam plastic

Unconventional methods of cutting foam plastic

Above we have listed all the ways to cut polystyrene foam in a straight line. But what if we need to cut out, for example, some kind of shape previously painted on foam plastic, a semicircle, a zigzag, a circle, or even in a straight line, but ideally evenly and in large quantities. A knife, jigsaw or saw will not help us here.

1. There is such an exotic option as cutting foam plastic with hot nichrome wire. Yes, you heard right! Even designers use this tool to implement design solutions. In addition, such a machine for cutting foam plastic is not difficult to assemble with your own hands at home.

In order to make such a machine for fast and high-quality cutting of foam plastic at home, we need nichrome wire, a small 24-volt transformer and a spring. The table will need to be installed at an angle of about 20-60 degrees. Then you need to pull the wire in the middle across the table. On one side of the table, firmly fix one end of the wire, and on the other, fix it through a spring.

Next, wires coming from a 24-volt transformer, which is powered from the mains, are attached to both ends of the nichrome wire. As soon as the current is applied, the wire begins to heat up (this is noticeable), so on top of the wire you need to put a sheet of foam plastic accordingly along the marking line. Due to the tilt of the table, the insulation sheets, under the influence of their own weight, will slide down and gradually cut through the material.

For accurate work, it is necessary that the wire turns slightly red, but it must not be allowed to become too hot. Since the high temperature will not cut, but will mercilessly melt, as a result the cut can turn out to be very wide.

Typically, when heated, the nichrome wire stretches and becomes a little longer, so the above-mentioned spring is needed, which must be elastic and strong. It helps adjust the wire length.

2. You can try to cut it with your own hands and at home using a grinder and a metal disc, although this is not the best option. It is recommended to use only the thinnest disc. This option is not very practical, because the grinder will make a lot of noise, and debris will spread in all directions. Therefore, it will be better if you use a diamond disc for an angle grinder.

3. Foam can also be cut at home with a simple soldering iron. Using it, you can carefully and quickly cut off the material. The end (tip) of the soldering iron should preferably be thick; if not, then it will need to be flattened a little with a hammer. After which a manufactured special part is put on it: a sharp blade is attached to a metal cap from an ordinary pen at the end. With this device you can easily cut not only straight lines, but also curly, semicircular, that is, parts of various shapes.

Video: FOAM CUTTING MACHINE

Many people wonder how to cut polystyrene foam at home. After all, this is one of the most popular and sought-after materials in construction, distinguished by many positive qualities and advantages. Polyfoam is intended for sound and heat insulation of residential premises. It is very easy to use, available in every hardware store, its cost is very small. The only difficulty can be caused by the process of cutting foam boards without crumbling.

Ordinary foam plastic - advantages of the material

Polystyrene foam or expanded polystyrene is a material white, consisting of almost 95 percent air. It belongs to the category of environmentally friendly materials, therefore it is not hazardous to health. A huge variety of products are made from polystyrene foam, including food packaging.

The different sizes of the plates, as well as the structure in the form of small gas pores, determine the main positive properties expanded polystyrene:

• High level of thermal insulation both internally and externally outside Houses. If you have learned how to cut polystyrene foam at home, you can install double insulation. Moreover, the cost of materials in any case will be much lower than that of other modern insulators that perform similar functions.
• Excellent acoustic insulation of rooms. This will be very useful in modern apartments, in which sound insulation is almost completely absent. Polystyrene foam is perfect for protecting yourself from noisy neighbors. And, naturally, the neighbors won’t hear either if you treat yourself to your favorite music at a high volume.
• Easy to install and install due to its low weight. The huge sheets weigh so little that even a child can handle them. The only thing worth paying attention to is the wind when doing outdoor finishing works. Even a slight blow of wind can disturb your workpieces, so it is not recommended to work with foam in windy weather.
• Environmental Safety. The material does not pose any danger to humans because it does not emit toxic gases or waste. The production of expanded polystyrene is carried out in accordance with all European norms and standards, so certain types of it may come into contact with food products.
• High resistance to negative impact fungi, bacteria, microorganisms, dampness, mold. Operation on outdoors for a long time will not cause any changes in consumer behavior, it will still be reliable and durable.

Before cutting foam, you should remember some rules for handling it. Thus, the vast majority of technical fluids cause irreparable damage to the material. IN Therefore, it is necessary to limit it from direct contact with solvents, gasoline, acetone and other similar liquids. Even pairs of the latter cause irreversible damage, which will certainly manifest themselves over time.

Another important factor is temperature. If polystyrene foam is used on surfaces with temperatures above 50 degrees Celsius, certain problems may arise. For example, the material begins to crumble and break even from simple touches. Therefore, its installation should be avoided, for example, next to stoves.

Areas of application – where foam is used

Due to the large number of advantages, this material has found the most wide application, and not only in construction industry.Thus, foam sheets can be used in such areas as:

1. 1. Medicine - here polystyrene foam is indispensable as packaging for acute and glass objects, and also as a case for equipment.
2. 2. Organizing active recreation - if you cut the foam into sheets required sizes, it can be inserted into floats, life jackets and even buoys.
3. 3. Design - specialists use the material to model and design various objects.
4. 4. Shipbuilding - here foam sheets are used as an unsinkable filler for cargo compartments on boats, dinghies and other small vessels.

Thus, cutting foam plastic at home is relevant not only for performing construction work for soundproofing an apartment. So, having mastered this art sufficiently, you will be able to make an unusual decorative figurine, build a model of a boat and even independently reproduce the protection of the refrigeration circuit located in the air conditioner.

Processing foam without crumbling - simple and effective methods

The peculiarity of cutting polystyrene foam is that the material is very light and brittle; if handled incorrectly, it begins to crumble and break. Some rules should be followed when working with foam boards. You can use many different tools for cutting, including a soldering iron, a sharp knife, a grinder, and even nichrome wire.

Mechanical processing of expanded polystyrene, despite all its advantages, can cause some difficulties, especially for inexperienced beginners. If you don’t know how to cut polystyrene foam so that it doesn’t crumble, then first of all take care of purchasing a sharp knife with a rubber tip. When working, you should remember that the blade can very easily slide off the surface of the material, so you need to work very carefully and carefully, performing all movements exclusively “to the side” and “away from you.”

There are several basic tools for machining expanded polystyrene:

• In some cases, a simple shoe knife will do. But only in cases where it is necessary to cut foam plastic up to 40 mm thick. Having sharpened a knife sharply, you should not hide the sharpener far, since every one and a half to two meters you will need to sharpen the blade again. It is recommended to wear headphones or insert earplugs into your ears, since the cutting process is accompanied by a not very pleasant “squealing” of the foam.
• The next tool that works great with polystyrene foam is a wood saw. Using a hacksaw we cut slabs up to 80 mm thick. It is recommended to buy a tool with thin small teeth, in which case the cut will be smoother and more accurate. The main advantage of a hacksaw over a knife is the minimal risk of injuring yourself. And you will need to apply significantly less force during work.
• A jigsaw is also great for cutting foam at home. The process moves as quickly and simply as possible, all actions are performed very clearly and accurately, the likelihood of causing injury to yourself is reduced to almost a minimum. In addition, a jigsaw belongs to the category of common and popular tools; a real owner simply must have this tool at his disposal.
• A tool such as a grinder is also often used. If you want to cut foam as quickly and without crumbling as possible, try to purchase the thinnest diamond blades. The cost of these discs is slightly higher than others, but the result is 100 percent worth the investment.

Unconventional cutting method - nichrome thread

All the methods presented above allow us to process polystyrene foam exclusively in a straight, even line. In situations where you need to make an unusual shape, a semicircle or a zigzag, you can use in unconventional ways. For example, nichrome thread. With its help, you will learn how to cut foam plastic so that it does not crumble, with minimal time and physical costs.

First you need to do some preparatory work for assembly necessary equipment. So, you should make sure you have a small spring, a 24-volt transformer and nichrome wire. Working surface The table is set at an angle from 20 to 60 degrees. We stretch the wire across the table. We fix the ends of the wire on each side of the table with a spring.

After this, we attach the wires coming from the transformer to the wire. When current is supplied to the transformer, the nichrome thread heats up, which is evident from its appearance. All we have to do is lay down a sheet of any thickness in accordance with the pre-applied markings. Under its own weight and due to the inclined surface, the polystyrene foam will slide down and at the same time cut through.

No garbage, everything happens very quickly and without unnecessary movements. The only difficulty is assembling the necessary equipment, since not everyone has transformers.

Thus, there is nothing overly complicated about how and how to cut polystyrene foam at home. Even with an ordinary knife you can perform all the necessary operations. If you purchase better equipment, the processing process will take a minimum of time, without additional effort, noise and debris.

The widespread availability of massive full-size foam boards automatically led to a boom in the use of a relatively durable, soft and at the same time easy-to-process material at home. In fact, it has become possible to manufacture a huge number of all kinds of useful things from a thick foam plastic sheet; you just need to choose a way, how and with what to cut the foam plastic, in order to prevent deformation, breakage or crumbling of the material.

Why is it difficult to cut foam?

The widespread use of foam plastic material was largely limited by its porous structure, which resembles a compressed layer of tiny polystyrene cells filled with a gas-forming agent.

If you have ever cut foam sheets, you have probably noticed this feature:

• The denser and heavier the material, the easier it is to cut it with sharpened tools. The thinner the cutting edge, the easier and faster it is to cut even the hardest urea foam;
• Lightweight foam grades are easiest to cut using electric tools. The higher the cutting edge speed, the cleaner the cutting surface. In industrial conditions, thin foam plastic boards are cut with a thin water jet, with virtually no waste;
• When you try to cut a slab with a sharp blade in several movements, a situation arises where each new cut almost doubles the amount of foam sawdust and dust.

Advice! Craftsmen prefer to cut thin foam plastic slabs using the shoemaker's method. To do this, using a sharpened wide blade with great effort, a cut is made with the knife towards you, without changing the angle of inclination and depth of the cut.

Most modelers and craftsmen who work professionally with foam plastic will argue that cutting foam plastic boards is not at all difficult, especially since the density and strength of the material is relatively low. And they will be right. Cutting polystyrene foam at home is not difficult; you just need to accurately select the mode and equipment for cutting foam plastic.

Number of options practical application and the use of polystyrene foam for those who know how to work with their own hands has long exceeded one hundred. Dozens of foam materials are made from various models, injection molds, toys, stucco moldings, decorative elements, insulation, details speaker systems and even refrigerators. The main problem accompanying any attempts to process the material mechanically, is the selection of the mode, how and with what to cut the foam so that it does not crumble, as a result, cutting is always accompanied by the formation of a large amount of waste.

If the tip cutting tool is not sharpened enough or moves at low speed, when trying to cut the smallest gas-filled balls, the cutting edge does not cut them, but slides along the polystyrene foam, crushes them and tears them out of the compressed mass of foam. It is possible to cut a foam sheet in this way, but a huge amount of waste is generated.

Technology on how to properly cut a sheet of foam plastic

For home use, we can offer several proven methods:

1. Using a sharpened shoemaker's or construction knife;
2. A hacksaw for metal with an improved hacksaw blade;
3. A powerful soldering iron with a razor blade attached to the tip;
4. A thermal cutter or a hot nichrome spiral;
5. A jigsaw or grinder.

Important! Whenever attempting to cut a foam sheet using hot blades, wires or high-speed tools, it is necessary to work under a hood or outdoors, since melting the foam releases a large amount of volatile toxic substances.

If you need to cut foam plastic using a jigsaw or grinder, you should definitely use a respirator and safety glasses. When cutting, foam dust becomes highly electrified and sticks with incredible force to the skin of the hands, face, and gets into the eyes and lungs.

Scheme of cutting foam plastic mechanically

The easiest way is to cut a thin slab, up to 50 mm, using a regular knife, even a table knife. To do this, a foam plate is placed on the edge of the work table and a cut is made. Cutting edge the knife should be as close as possible to the supporting plane. Before cutting, the blade must be sharpened and trimmed on a polishing wheel.

The part of the sheet to be cut must be supported so that the material does not break off under load. To cut with maximum quality, the knife is moved with little effort in one direction - “away from you”, reverse stroke the blades perform “idle”. If you have to cut a sheet laid out on a table top with a shoe knife, then the direction of application of the force changes to the opposite - “toward yourself”.

It is strictly not recommended to cut thin-sheet foam material while hanging or in a vertical position.

It is much easier to cut foam with a hacksaw. For dense grades, the hacksaw blade does not need to be changed; for highly porous foam sheets side surfaces The blades are ground on a grindstone to remove tooth set. With a hacksaw you can cut in almost any position without restrictions.

The most productive tool for cutting sheets is an angle machine or grinder. Depending on the diameter of the cutting wheel, a grinder can cut foam up to 50 mm thick on the fly. In this case, the quality of the cut will be much higher than when using a knife or saw. The disadvantage of this method is the large amount of dust and chips. If you reduce the cutting speed of foam plastic to a minimum, the material will begin to burn and melt, which is not always allowed by the cutting conditions.

Simply cut the foam sheet using a jigsaw. In terms of productivity and cutting quality, a jigsaw is inferior to an angle grinder, but it has an invaluable advantage - it can be used to make shaped cuts that are difficult to obtain using other mechanical cutting methods.

Thermal methods for cutting foam plastic

The second most common method of cutting foam is a thermal cutter. Essentially, it is a nichrome thread laid on a frame in the form of a frame. When passing electric current By nichrome wire the metal surface heats up and melts the foam. There are several design options for the cutter. The simplest one looks like a nichrome string stretched on ceramic insulators installed at the ends of a wooden or metal frame.

With this tool you can cut not only foam sheets, but also wooden slats, plastic pipes, any material with a melting or decomposition temperature of up to 270 o C.

If you need to cut slabs with a long cutting length, then it will be more convenient to use a machine in the form of a vertically stretched thread on a PCB stand.

To control the heating of the nichrome string, an LATR or rheostat is used. Too much heat surfaces can lead to melting and even ignition of the foam. A remarkable property of this cutting method is the complete absence of dust and chips; in addition, the cut surface turns out to be melted, as if covered with alkyd varnish.

If during processing of foam plastic it is necessary to cut off only small fragments foam block, for example, when making a sculpture or model, it is best to use an attachment for a powerful electric soldering iron.

Special mention should be made of the most interesting way cutting foam plastic with a laser. This may seem like science fiction; laser cutting of foam plastic is possible even at home, photo. A conventional LED laser with a power of 2-5 W allows you to cut a sheet of foam along a completely arbitrary trajectory.

While such a tool is capable of cutting paper and foam plastic within 10-15 minutes, it will be very difficult to achieve large volumes of cutting with it.

Polystyrene foam is used by builders in the most for different purposes. This material exhibits high thermal insulation qualities, therefore they are used to insulate building facades, floors and other objects. Various decorative elements are also made from this material.

Polystyrene foam is easy to process and easy to cut. But at the same time, the material can crumble greatly. The destruction of an array is a negative phenomenon. Therefore, it is necessary to properly handle this material, you need to know before starting work. At the same time, from solid foam plastic it will be possible to create not only slabs for insulation, but also decorative products. Their appearance will be neat, and the material will not collapse.

Features of foam

Foam plastic is in every way lightweight material. The polymer is mixed with air and foam filling components. Its structure is similar to glued balls. It is this feature that explains why we cut the foam instead of breaking it. Otherwise, the cutting will be uneven.

In some types of material, the balls of the structure are held tighter and do not crumble. But quite often the foam crumbles, sometimes very badly. Such destruction of the material is dangerous for the sheet. The fragility of foam plastic leads to a change in shape, a decrease in properties and functional qualities.

If it is necessary to adjust the dimensions of the array, this operation is carried out using a special tool. In this case, the sheet will not be destroyed.

Types of tools

When studying the question of how to properly cut polystyrene foam at home, you need to pay attention to the types of tools. They are divided into mechanical and thermal. For independent cutting of an array, with small volumes of work, preference is given to the first group of means.

For home processing of polystyrene foam, novice craftsmen are recommended to choose mechanical tool. Professional installers and designers prefer thermal cutting. In this case, it will be possible to create high precision edges and create objects of any complexity.

A thermal cutter is quite expensive. Novice craftsmen who carry out repairs at home rarely purchase such equipment. But for large volumes of work it is simply irreplaceable. Actions using a thermal cutter are performed quickly and efficiently.

Tool production method

When considering the question of how to properly cut polystyrene foam so that the sheet does not crumble, you should take a closer look at the method of making the tool. It can be factory-made or home-made.

Professional builders It is mandatory to purchase special certified equipment. Whether it is a mechanical or thermal tool, for such purposes it is necessary to carry out work with factory-made equipment. The fact is that when creating such devices, the developers provided it with everything as much as possible. necessary qualities, safety and comfort. This is very important when doing a large amount of work.

But when doing repairs yourself, it is not profitable to purchase special equipment. In this case, you can create it yourself. This will be a more primitive device, but it will be able to cope with the tasks assigned to it.

Mechanical cutting

First of all, we should consider the main mechanical devices, which can be used to cut foam plastic. How to cut the material depends on the skills of the master and the amount of work. Such tools include a knife, grinder, saw and jigsaw. To independently cut the slabs in the process of arranging the insulation layer, it is better to use a knife. Its blade should be of medium hardness. This tool allows you to cut slabs up to 8 cm thick quite efficiently and quickly.

A jigsaw, grinder or saw is used only when special works. Professional builders use such equipment. In this case, the tool differs in a number of parameters from conventional angle grinders, jigsaws or saws.

If a thick blade and high rotation speeds are used, the foam can be easily damaged. Therefore, at home, a knife with replaceable blades is used for cutting.

Thermal cutter

Achieve high precision Thermal equipment allows cutting. It is purchased professional craftsmen and designers. When carrying out a large amount of work at home, you should also pay attention to this type of equipment. In this case we cut the foam

The device is powered by the system or battery. Through the elements of this technique, electricity is supplied to the nichrome thread. The metal heats up quickly and strongly. This allows you to efficiently cut off excess foam and cut it in any direction.

The most accurate processing of the material is obtained by using a thermal cutter. It should be noted that foam does not react well to heat, but in this case the cut is made very quickly. Therefore its quality is high.

Homemade cutter

You can create a thermal cutter yourself. To do this you need to assemble a set necessary details. First of all, you will need a small transformer. You can take this part, for example, from an old TV.

In this case, you will also need to cut the foam with a nichrome string. It is pulled between two long screws. They must be secured to a wooden plank. Such material is known to not conduct current. Therefore, electricity from the transformer will only flow to the screws and string.

After connecting all elements, the voltage should be adjusted. It depends on the thickness. A string that is too hot will not allow you to cut the material properly.

Easy way to cut

The presented approaches make it easy to cut foam. How to cut such material, give advice folk craftsmen. They came up with another way. It will be quite effective, especially when cutting large sheets of foam.

To do this you will need a thin and strong string. Its ends are tied to wooden handles. If the sheet is large, you need to do the work together with an assistant. In this case, there are 2 people on both sides of the array. Everyone takes wooden handle with a string attached. Next, they move the thread along the pre-drawn markings. It heats up from friction.

The material is easily and quickly cut. If the leaf is small, you can perform this procedure yourself.

There are a few tips from professional installers to take into account when processing foam. It will be easy to choose what to cut it with. Experts say that each of the presented methods is suitable for cutting. It all depends on the skills of the master and the amount of work he performs.

Before cutting, the material must be marked with a simple pencil. With mechanical and thermal method The foam may become hot. In this case, he allocates environment harmful substances. Therefore, the work is carried out outdoors.

In this case, special equipment is used. Otherwise, when heated, the material will stick to the blade. A grinder or jigsaw works at low speeds. This allows heat to be removed from the cutting zone.