[Reuben Hoff III]

All fabricating with Avonite,

I have always been puzzled with the way Avonite says for their substrate so i was wondetring what most do?

Thw lattice method is nice, but then when you go over the dishwasher what do you do ? If do the runner method like most other brands Do you need to but support strips in cabinets past the 24″ width rule ie 33″ base or is that still considered fine?

Also was curious why they require such a wide substrate peice 4″?

Any input on what you all do as standard practice would be nice and maybe unconfuse me trying to exp;ain this to the help why we do it this way for ond brand and this for another.

Reuben

[Andy Graves]

Most fabricators do a full perimeter support and then add support within 3″ from any opening and seams. Whether this is right for all brands, I don’t think that is the case but it works very well.

We add support on all the partitions of the cabinets because we think it gives the counter a more solid feel after it is siliconed in place. Not so hollow sounding.

[Bob Petrov]

Reuben,

The avonite book says to run it lengthwise, along the length so it bridges the dishwasher with three strips, front, back and middle. They used to have a front to back runner in the book, would tell you to cross it out during training class and not do it that way. I will do it that way on occasion when it makes more sense, like if you have very wide cabinets that offer no support.

If I remember correctly, they ask for 3/4″ thick minumum. We use two layer of 1/2″ so we can cross lap all joints for rigidity.

Hope this helps.

[Reuben Hoff III]

Yeah it does. I have been doing the perimeter method all along, but was looking back at the manual to double check things so if I tell help look it up or review this and it was showing lattice (front to back ) or parimeter but cabinet had to have support every 24″, so got confuseed looked at hand notes when took class and no mention to do it different. I checked the manual on this site and it matches the one I got so hince wanting to check I am still doing it correct.

I se 15/16 MDF for my substrate.

Reuben

[Wags]

Most of Avonite being a polyester and less filled it requires a center support. Easiest is to do three runners, front, middle and back. You then are assured you will “catch” every cabinet support structure available. Polyester does not flex like acrylic does. I have seen a number of tops where a customer stood on it to change a can light bulb and the top cracked in the middle when not supported properly. 15/16″ MDF would be the ideal support. Be sure to use silicone as the unfilled poly will expand and contract more than acrylic.

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