Plastic
From CosplayWiki
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Clear Plastics:
Acrylic is Plexiglass. Plexiglass is the name brand of sheets of Acrylic used to replace glass windows, hence the name. It's no different then how a lot of people call tissues Kleenex a lot of time. Kleenex = brand name, tissues = generic name for the item.
Also acrylic can be bonded chemically with CA (cyanoacrylite) glue, aka most superglues, to create (supposedly) seamless clear bonds.
On a similar note:
Polycarbonate is Lexan.
Lexan is GE's brand name for polycarbonate. It's a clear impact resistant plastic which is also used for window replacement.
The differences between acrylic and polycarbonate are this. Polycarbonate is a lot stronger. While in the cosplay field that usually won't matter much, it can. Acrylic tends to crack/fracture like glass does. It can leave some sharp edges and potentially break if you drop it depending on how heavy it is. While polycarbonate won't crack or shatter it's typically a lot more expensive. However if you plan to drill through acrylic be very careful as it will chip or break if you do it to fast.
How to tell the difference:
The best way is to read, wherever you're getting it from will probably say. If you're buying it from the window section of Home Depot or Lowe’s I believe typically acrylic is covered in a clear blue film while polycarbonate is in a clear green film.
If you have some clear plastic and you aren't sure what kind it is there's an easy way to distinguish the two. Take a file or some cutting tool and rough up the end a bit. If it's acrylic it should give off a pretty strong odor similar to the places in malls that do fake nails, because yes, those are made of acrylic.
Credits
Thanks to Alex Evangelou for allowing us to post this information.
