Acrylic Glass

Hi everybody,

I have a weekly route customer ( a donut shop ) that has a huge amount of big and tall glass ( non - tempered ). The owner has had such an issue with people shooting BB guns and Pellet guns and vandalizing the glass that he his having Acrylic Installed. Does anyone have experience at cleaning large areas of this. I know we will not be able to use conventional cleaning techniques. I do know that there are very costly and involved procedures, just really not interested in getting into all of that for one customer. Any ideas ?

Jeff

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It’s easy to clean, just remember it’s softer than glass so do not use razor blades or anything abrasive like glass polish or steel wool or white scrubby pads.

Soapy water will clean it fine. Acrylic has a bit more drag on the squeegee than glass so as it ages and gets rougher you might find straight pulls become easier than fanning.

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unless its bullet proof i think it’s gonna look like crap almost instantly. sorry i guess i don’t have anything constructive.

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I’ve got a store I do here that has one that the owner replaced with Acrylic. I’m assuming plexi and acrylic are the same. It’s scratched beyond visibility. I’ve never used anything but a mop and squeegee on it, but It sticks out like a sore thumb.

I want to clarify that I do know that using standard procedures will etch and haze the Acrylic over time. I have experienced this with smaller pieces on both residential and commercial jobs with this material when cleaned over a period of time.
So, there is no recommendation by manufactures to clean this type of glass with regular window cleaning tools which we use. They actually warn against it. My curiosity was, if any of you clean this type over a long period of time and what techniques other than standard you might use.

And I agree, Acrylic looks very bad and hazy and yellowish over time from my experience.

Thanks again !!

Yep. Well said everyone. I could write for hours on this one. Acrylic IS plexi. It cracks up fron UV radiation over time. Scraches very EZ. Lexan is polycarbonate. Totally different chemistry. Scratches just as EZ. Much more pricey. Tends to yellow out over time. Especially the older formula polycarbonates. It will yellow before it cracks up. Chems will affect the two in different ways too. Same way though. Acrylic tends to crack whereas polycarb tends to white out or haze over.

I wrote all about this on my Products blog too. It is a big part of being Glass Smart. Even though these two plastics are certainly not glass. We still have to clean them. It grates me! I prefer glass.

Henry

It seems like even wind will scratch Acrylic.

You could get all fancy and use a microfibres cloth to apply and Buff off a fancy plastic cleaner/wax. The ones with extra slippery polymers and encapsulating agents… o whatever they say on the packet.

But in reality this acrylic is here to take the brunt of the bb pellets and stop idiots scratching the glass. It’s not in front of the Mona Lisa and any minor gradual damage you MAY cause over the years is negligible… especially compared to the smiley face drawn in pellet shots and the big scratch made with a rock that says ““Jimmmmmzyyyy woz here”” which will appear next week.

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nitpicking bastard reporting for duty:
acrylic…is not…glass!
:rolling_eyes:
:cactus:27
now carry on as if everything was normal!