This week, the task was to make something big. I wanted to make furniture for my apartment and try out the sculpt and slicer features of Fusion 360.
This week, the task was to make something big. I wanted to make furniture for my apartment and try out the sculpt and slicer features of Fusion 360.
I started out wanting to make a chair. The sculpt feature was surprisingly intuitive, and I was able to model much more quickly than if I were to design parametrically. Symmetry constraints allowed me to mirror changes on both sides, but there were limitations, such as intersection errors if I sculpted too much. Overall, I enjoyed this method of 3D modeling.
The integration into Slicer was surprisingly easy. I was able to change the chair dimension, adjust the number of slices and where they were laid out. The killer feature was the ability to create dog ears based on drill size and specify the material thickness to create the slots.
Since we were limited to two boards, I had to lower the number of shapes and wasn't particularly happy with the end result. I decided to pivot and make something more simple: a bench.
I went through the same process of sculpting to create the bench and exported to slicer once again.
After some minor adjustments to the slice count, I decided to use this as a template to cut. I exported to a .DXF file and then opened it into VCarve at the machine shop.
The first step was to create drill holes to stabilize the board while cutting. I create holes and specified the toolpath for drilling. This create a new layer in the toolpath.
Then I created the profile toolpath to cut out the shapes. I also needed to create tabs so the the pieces wouldn't move around. VCarve saves its files as a .CRV file. In order to send the file to be read on the shopbot, I needed to select each layer and export individually as a .LOG file. Since I had two boards to cut, I ended up having 4 files to be sent.
The first step was the get the plywood onto the table and drill holes on the outside. These are holes that supplement the drill holes we will be cutting. Next, I had to zero the toolpath on the X, Y, and Z planes. One mistake we make early on was to zero the Z according to our plywood instead of zeroing on the sacrificial layer and moving the distance by the average thickness.
Round 1 of cutting the holes.
Profile path being cut.
First board cut!
Parts laid out.
Slicer creates an assembly manual for you which is super handy.
Assembly.
Final product! (It's about 3 feet wide and 1 feet tall)
!