Score it several times.
Use a 40 tooth blade on your skil saw.

Were you using an actual scoring tool or something else? It works for me, is all I'm saying. Score from both sides, if need be. You could also use a tablesaw with a plywood blade and a zero-clerance insert. A bandsaw with a fine blade and zero-clearance insert would be ok as well.
Casey

I use a jigsaw with a metal cutting blade. A band saw also works well for smaller pieces.

I use my band saw whenever possible.

DH says he uses a bandsaw....

Plexiglass (acrylic) is very hard to work with because it's so brittle. My best suggestion is to visit a local glass shop and have them cut it to the exact sizes you need. You'll probably pay a bit more than at the big box store but you'll save a lot of frustration.

Mike

Glass shop or switch to polycarbonate (lucite).
Much tougher (thick fighter canopies) and cuts cleanly without fracturing.
It is prefered for protecting glass from breakage (burglar proofing sidelights, etc).

brickeye,

Did you mean Lexan for polycarbonate? If I'm not mistaken Lucite is a brand name for acrylic sheets.

Mike

Yes. Lexan.
Much nicer stuff to deal with and far bettter than acrylic (polymethyl methacrylate).

Using Lexan and a bandsaw with fine teeth always worked for me.

I needed to cut some acrylic panels for use in a suspended ceiling. After trying scoring, sawing and several of the above suggested methods I tried a chisel-pointed soldering iron. Whether it was curved cuts, holes, or cuts leaving a thin section that would be prone to breaking off, it went slow (about 1 inch per second) but it cut it like butter.

I just use my table saw and a rip fence. Move the piece through nice and slow. I have cut a lot of this stuff for my kid's 4H projects with no problems.

To cut plexiglass with even a fine toothed saber saw blade you need to keep a constant stream of cold water on the blade. Hold the spray bottle with your off hand, aim the water at the front (cutting edge) of the blade and the stream of water will turn what would have been a melted blob of blade stopping plexiglass into a sort of cream of wheat mixture that will flow away with the water. Need to brace the plexiglass down with clamps, however, cause this manuever requires both hands.

I use a curcular saw with a plywood blade in it.

Plywood blades have several hundred tiny teeth.

I set the depth of cut to be just deeper than the sheet material is thick.

The teeth are small enough, and the angle of the teeth, due to the small depth of cut, is shallow enough where they don't grab and shatter the material.

Works well on all plastic materials.

Mongo

I use a circular saw with a fine tooth blade mounted backwards and have no problems.

Has anyone ever tried to use a wet saw?

i used a grinder and a zip cut disc 4",just go slowly you do not want to melt it to drip melted plastic everywhere!

I use a table saw and a rip fence. Take it slow to minimize edge chipping. The pieces I have cut were always within a wood frame where the edges were in a groove so you could not see any of the chipping, so this method worked nice, and gave me a perfect width cut.

If you tape the area you are going to cut with masking tape of some sort it helps with cutting also. It don't chip out hardly at all and gives a nice place to mark your line also.

LASER!

How about corrugated wave form sheets? (Not sure of the material, but it's clear.) I tried a metal blade in a jigsaw with poor results. I'll try the plywood blade in a circular saw next.

i used a dremel multimax with a half circular drywall blade. it worked fine. to cut smaller holes i used a dremel trio with the cement board bit. you have to move the bit up and down to prevent the plastic from biulding up on the bit' but it works fine.

To cut plexiglass leave the the paper on and lay the sheet to be cut on a flat, even surface. Using a yardstick and a grease pencil mark the sizes of the pieces to be cut on the paper. When this is complete use a glass cutter to score the lines. It is wise to use the yardstick as a straight edge to follow while doing this and to score the lines 5 to 10 times. When the lines are scored place the scored line on the edge of the table and apply a sharp, downward pressure until the pieces snap in two.

Cut some plexiglass the other day, but first checked out this old post. What worked for me was a 104 tooth plywood blade mounted backward in my 10" table saw. Hand-sanded the edges to soften them. Bernie

Since my original response in 06, I cut some 1/4" plexiglass on my tablesaw with a 7 1/4" plywood blade, no zero clearance insert; it cut fine with no tearout or chipping, just left some sort of melted fuzz along the edges, which was fine, because it didn't affect the surface. I made a security panel for a stained glass door lite.
Casey

After reading all these posts we were really nervous about cutting plexiglass, then my husband remembered the multi-tool I had given him for Christmas from Sears. It vibrates - the blade doesn't go around like with a circular saw or up and down like a jigsaw. We used the circular fine toothed blade that was included in the kit and ran it at the slowest speed. After marking our lines on the paper coating, he made 4 successively deeper cuts with the tool. There was some melting even at the slower speed but not a big problem. After the last cut which was usually between 2/3 to 3/4 of the way thru, he moved the plexiglass to the edge of the cutting table and snapped the piece off. It wasn't a totally smooth cut so we finished by scraping the melted/rough edges off and sanding with my Mouse sander and fine grit sandpaper. We cut 9 pieces, some small, some larger from an 18"x48" piece of 1/4 inch plexiglass - with no breakage or chipping! Awesome!

These may be old postings but the info is what I needed right now. All these tools mentioned were somewhere else, when I remembered my miniaturize Saws-all. A fine tooth metal blade was in it already and after taping my lines the saw did quick work cutting at 30 degrees angle on the 1/8 inch plexiglass.
I didn't support my panel very well and and a section of the panel hanging out over the garbage buggy broke off.
My piece came out great.

If you use a toothed blade u\you need a very shallow angle for the teeth going in and out of the material.

On a table saw the blade should barely extend through the material.

On a sawzall the blades\ needs t be almost parallel to the face of the panel to make a long shallow cut.

Jig saws with a vertical blade do not work all that well without a very fine bade.

You want about 3 teeth in contact with the material during the cut.

Putting wood on each side of the piece (even plywood) and than cutting works better than almost anything. It just wastes a lot of plywood and clamping the sandwich together can be real PITA.