cleaning up air holes on enclosure?

[Ryuti]

I just finished putting in some air holes into some tupperware containers for my new Ts but there is some plastic sticking in/out of the enclosure from when i was pulling the hot screwdriver in/out, and it both looks ugly, and might be dangerous if for some reason it ran over the holes (very scratchy)

any ideas to clean it up? way too hard to just pick it off with my fingers.

 

[Lander9021]

Snip off the bits sticking in and sand them down with fine sandpaper...make sur e there are no bits left inside ..because your right it is dangerous, hope this helps

 

[Ryuti]

Snip off the bits sticking in and sand them down with fine sandpaper...make sur e there are no bits left inside ..because your right it is dangerous, hope this helps

That took forever but i'm finally done (only two enclosures but getting them perfectly cut was a PITA)

the sand paper made the enclosure all scratchy though which is a shame lol

 

[Lander9021]

I'd of just wrapped it around my finger and scratch away with it then wash it after

 

[Ryuti]

I'd of just wrapped it around my finger and scratch away with it then wash it after

That was kinda what I did I didn't use a huge piece. there's only a couple scratches by a few of the holes.

 

[Lander9021]

Still, its better than having sharp sprues stabbing your ts

 

[Spidermolt]

Using a razor takes only a few seconds and cleans it up really well unlike sandpaper which might scratch up your container.

 

[sas]

Use painter's tape and tape off the back of the holes to keep debris from falling into you enclosure. Get small wire cutters or a razor blade and sheer off the larger bits and then sand off the remaining rough spots.

 

[Venom1080]

never bothered with it. never had a problem.

 

[lunarae]

You know, with some of those softer plastics....I wonder if one of those old school metal hole punchers would work for putting holes in at least on lids and around the tops.

 

[viper69]

You know, with some of those softer plastics....I wonder if one of those old school metal hole punchers would work for putting holes in at least on lids and around the tops.

Not really, the plastic lids/walls are too thick. That is the entire piece of plastic itself, edges etc do not fit between the small space of the hole punchers jaws..tried it!

 

[lunarae]

Not really, the plastic lids/walls are too thick. That is the entire piece of plastic itself, edges etc do not fit between the small space of the hole punchers jaws..tried it!

lol. I wasn't sure. Good to know XD

 

[reptyls]

A leather punch will work, and it has diferent sized holes.

 

[TarantulasWorld]

Razor blade or pliers and some soft sandpaper should do the trick just fine

 

[bryverine]

I use a large drill bit or one of these.

Deburring tool

 

[BorisTheSpider]

I use a soldiering iron with a temp control and a variety of precision soldiering tips . I set the temp so that it's just warm enough to easily melt through the plastic . I find that using a tip cleaner in between melting each hole will eliminate rough spots and over-melt . With the precision tips you can get from very tiny almost pinhole sized holes all the way up to pencil thick holes , depending on your needs .

 

[EulersK]

Since we're all talking about what we use, I recently discovered the wonders of a rotary tool. One tool with a few attachments does everything I need.

 

[Formerphobe]

What sized spiders are going in those containers? Those look like pretty big holes.

Depending on the type of plastic, I use a high speed drill with appropriate sized bit, or the fine tip on my soldering iron. With heavier plastics or acrylic, there is sometimes bits of "klingons" that pick off easily with fingernail.

 

[The Snark]

How about just using spurred brad point drill bits like these?
http://www.irwin.com/tools/drill-bits/brad-point-drill-bits

If you are really fussy you can go the route gunsmiths and similar use to produce absolutely perfectly clean holes by using an undersized drill bit then a reamer.