$55 for a plastic dust cover? I don't blame you for balking at that price. I have a number of dust covers, but very few are clear; I guess most people back in the day weren't interested in staring at their pride and joy machines like the collectors of today are.

Here's a suggestion: If displaying the typewriter is a high priority then what about making a rigid clear plastic box for it? It would look classier and be easier to see through than a flexible plastic cover, and it would be fairly easy to make. All you would need to do is to cut five panels to shape and then weld them together with glue. You can buy such display boxes, but then you'd be back into paying a lot for the cover whereas I can't image a sheet of clear plastic would cost all that much.

I started looking into it myself, and found there's a big cost difference between the different types of plastic that are available, such as acrylic versus lexan for example. However, since this is just a dust cover, there's really no need to invest in the stronger and more expensive plastics such as lexan or perspex. I've found a few wholesalers in my area for acrylic sheets, but they don't have any prices listed online. And the local hardware box stores have list prices that are clearly more expensive than you would pay a specialist retailer.

Your best bet, I think, is going to be to have the plastic pieces cut to size, and then have their edges polished, but do the final assembly yourself.  I should think that 6mm (1/4 inch) material would be thick enough for this job.  Unless you are very confident, I would go for plain, butted-togeher pieces rather than frame or edge them with wood or metal, since this requires rather skilled and accurate cutting and fitting work.
I would begin in plan, cutting a piece of paper to the exact size of the base area of your box.  Then work out the height required for the box.  Using the thickness of the sheet material as your reference dimension, draw the bottom edges of the sides on your plan, and subtract the sheet thickness from the height of the box to allow for the top, which will be the same size as your plan.  You now have a cutting list with the width and length of the five pieces required, which you can take to a plastics supplier for costing.  Good luck, and let us know how you go.

Last edited by beak (11-3-2015 09:35:37)

On another tack entirely, just to make soft dust covers, I'm planning to get the sewing machine out, and make a few covers using a nice sixties flat bedsheet I got. Bedsheets are a good tight weave. I guess I'll do a couple of sizes, but not model-by-model shaping...That'll do for the ones that are in use at any given time.

I just located a flexible plastic cover online from this place called Hard to Find Office Supplies- it was $22.xx USD with shipping included, and seems like it would fit my machine, so I decided to go with that for now. With my machine being on a typewriter stand that fits it just with little room to spare, a flexible cover seemed like it would work out better, since there is not really any room for the edges of a rigid cover to rest