Alternative material to folded plate metal

Hi guys,

I’ve designed a lamp where the main body is constructed from 1.6mm folded mild steel (I’ve attached pictures below for reference). However for legal reasons I’d prefer to be able to replace this metal part with a non-conductive alternative. The problem is I’m not entirely certain that any good alternative exists; Some sort of rigid plastic might work, but then I’d have issues with tooling, and creating draft angles etc. The only other material I can think of is laminated wood veneers, which might offer a good stiffness without too much of an increase in thickness, but I suspect the layup process might be time consuming, and I’m not sure you can get small radius curves of less than 2cm.

Does anyone here have good experience with laminating wood or know of a good alternative material that I might have missed?

Thanks!


Bent acrylic sheet (Plexiglas) is what you think you want. Both translucent or opaque, available in colors.

1.6mm might be a tad too thin to get the strength you need for this.

Can be worked with both machine, “woodworking” tools, and bent using a hot air gun. Complex shapes benefit from a jig, or holding fixture.

See> strip heating and bending jigs

Polycarbonate (lexan) is another viable option. Can be brakeformed like sheet metal (to a degree of course).

Thanks for your advice guys! I’m gonna try using pexiglass first simply since it’s so easy to get ahold of and work with, hopefully I will only need a 3mm thickness to get the stiffness required…