Electrical socket blanks

Although normally you can't cut white plastic or acrylic I have found through experimentation that you can cut electrical socket blanks which are white this is a different type of plastic (Urea Formaldehyde), it is quite a hard heat resistant plastic which means that it takes a large number of passes to actually cut through, also as there is sometimes support bars at the back of the blank sockets you may find that you need to cut these through to finish the cut through using a router tool.

Heath Warning

Cutting Urea Formaldehyde can release toxic formaldehyde fumes into the air. Health effects from formaldehyde are generally not seen when air concentrations are below 1.0 parts per million (ppm). If you cut this material you must be in a well ventilated area with an extraction system and use protective equipment such as googles, gloves and respirator mask.

DO NOT ATTEMPT TO CUT THIS MATERIAL UNLESS YOU HAVE TAKE THE PROPER PRECAUTIONS TO PROTECT YOUR HEALTH. IF IN DOUBT, DO NOT ATTEMPT THIS.

 When cutting the material there is a certain amount of oily substance generated on the surface of the material but this does not affect the cut and can be easily cleaned off. I did find it useful to do cuts in some scrap wood to make sure that this holes that you were cutting were correct for when you wanted to insert the various components. The settings used at: 600mm at 100% with 25 cuts.

This shows the blank after cleaning the surface using just washing-up liquid and water. Avoid getting any of the residue on your skin (see above). You can see that the cuts are clearly defined.

One of the experiments I've done is to create a grill for a temperature sensor. I tried two different approaches one was to create a large cut out and insert an existing grill element (on the right) and the other was to cut the grill out using the laser cutter ( on the left).

I've done some pictures below to show some examples of how I've cut electrical blanks to allow me to add sensors and a thermostat to a standard socket.