I’ve recently gone down a rabbit hole with vacuum forming and came across the usage of RenShape in some ~3 yr old Carbide 3D YouTube videos as well as Winston’s ~5 yr old video on using it to make bucks for vacuum forming. For a time, Carbide was offering small blocks of these materials at this URL in the shop, which is now a 404 - https://shop.carbide3d.com/collections/materials/products/3x5-synthetic-wood-qty-5.
It looks like RenShape itself has been discontinued. However, the manufacturer, Freeman, now makes some newer similar materials like the M-3700 modeling board FMSC - Freeman M-3700 Modeling Board.
Does Carbide 3D have any intentions of offering something like this in small sizes for customers to try? If not, I was going to reach out directly to Freeman Supply to see about quotes for a small quantity of M-3700. Has anyone purchased any of this newer product and machined it on their Shapeoko? They don’t have any pricing information on their website.
I seem to remember reading good things about their model board but I can’t recall where.
It looks like they supply a little trial kit though if you’re interested in a very small trial: FMSC - Machinable Media Sample Kit
$25 coupon off your next order from freemansupply as well. I suppose that offsets the cost a bit, assuming you like what you get
I got a quote from Freeman for the M-3700 50mm thickness. It’s currently about $248 for roughly a 60” by 20” board, but freight shipping is required which would increase that cost significantly. I think I’ll stick to MDF for now!
Before Carbide 3D, we did a lot of model-making and prototyping for different companies. Because of the freight, we bought a couple of sheets of RenShape in various thicknesses so we’d always have some on hand. I don’t think we ever had to reorder, and it was a huge benefit to always have RenShape in the corner. (It might still be in the corner if I wander through the shop right now)
That’s not to say that a stack of RenShape would be worth it to anyone else, but it was worth it for us.
Thanks, Rob. Pretty simple model. I had to make it Male as the material being vac-formed has a texture on the outside. The line scratched about 2" up is the trim line. Any wrinkles that happen below that are OK.
I paid twice that for the same size T-7500. But I have a Freeman location pretty close so I can pick it up. Material cost went to the customer, and I have some left.
Makes sense! I managed to find an architecture firm here in Raleigh, NC that makes tons of models in-house. They work with RenShape quite a bit. I am trying to arrange buying some of their offcut materials.
