Plastic Welding...You Can Do It!

Ok! Plastic welding, How did we apply this to building the sailboat?



Water tanks, extra pieces were made into toilet waste tank, shower drain pump reservoir, kitchen sink reservoir.

Plastic welding equipment you have a hot gas (usually air), directed onto the pieces that are going to be joined. Hot gas welding has a welding tool (torch) a heating unit heats the gas. Depending on your unit that your using, the heat is typically 660' F.

Different nozzle shapes are available for the welding tool.

Filler rods most of the time are circular, triangular shapes are also available.

Keep in mind, Important!

Use the same base material for the filler rods as the pieces being joined together.

The nozzle is designed to give out the right amount of hot air (gas). The welding rod is fed through the nozzle into the prepared corners or pieces your joining. The nozzle end is designed to give you just the right amount of hot gas and filler rod.

Plastic welding reminds me of mig welding so much.

Hot gas welding equipment is very portable.

Please make sure that the areas you are welding have a clean surface. No finger prints, grease, dirt or you will not have a good weld. You can use lacquer thinner to clean the plastic up and follow behind with a clean rag to wipe up any excess.

After joining the 2 pieces, the melting filler rod cools off the ends or corners to become solid.

The tools we used to cut the plastic sheets are a circular saw, ban saw.

Circular Saw **make sure you have a plastic blade, made for cutting plastic**

Use a file on the ends (edges)of the plastic to get rough edges smoother.

We used food grade plastic polyethylene sheets to make the water tanks. * This sailboat can hold about 500 gallons of water. * 2- 125 gallons of fresh drinking water. * 1- 250 gallon tank, holds shower, sink, toilet water.

The shower drain, kitchen sink reservoirs can be made to the opening you have available. The boxes that were welded together are water tight. If the pump fails the reservoir will back up into the shower instead of coming into the rest of the boat.

Keep in mind all of our water tanks have an aluminum shell surrounding them. The plastic areas that are welded together are not strong enough to support the weight of the water pressing against the walls.



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