I have a large sheet of what I think is 1/4" ABS. I need to make one long, clean, straight cut and I am not sure what kind of saw blade I need, or indeed if the saws I have are appropriate. (One Worx 4.5" corded saw and one Milwaukee 8" cordless.)
The cut doesn’t have to look laser clean, but the item is not replaceable so I don’t want to start experimenting. Appreciate it if anyone has any advice.
I just picked some up tonight for my saber saw. Do either of these have a speed control? I ask because you will want to slow it down if you can.
There are blades in most sizes for hard plastics but I’ve seen the fine tooth plywood blade reversed trick used a lot. By reversed they just mean to put it on backwards.
Oh, wow, a quick google tells me that you want to use that blade if you don’t have a lot to cut. The 8" blades run around $60!
Slow rotational speed and a pretty high feed rate of the stock through the blade is the way to go. ABS is soft, so you can push it harder than acrylic. When I cut acrylic I use a carbide toothed blade at slow speed and it works well.
That plywood blade will leave a lot of burr on the underside of the cut. A larger chisel tooth may give a cleaner cut.
I haven’t run that type of blade backward. Based on the tooth shape it should work. Its going to rattle a lot though as the teeth push the material away from the saw blade.
Use your plywood blade. Turn your saw blade around where the teeth are backwards. I cut a lot of HDPE for my dog kennels. HDPE is very soft and melts easily. As @ben1 said, ABS is soft as well. It will melt and coat the blade quickly. Spray the blade with dry silicone lube beforehand.