Week 1 - CCC
Computer Controlled Cutting and other Curious Conundrums
This week we dived in the deep end to cut with laser and razor. We started off by gaining access to the shop (thank you Dan) and meeting the machines. Theres an Epilog, an XTool P2, an XTool F1, a Thunder that should be ressurected soon and another XTool for all your metalic needs. I promptly found a favorite in the Xtool P2- unfortunately, it was by far the favorite for everyone else too.
With these machines in mind, I started designing for calculating the right kerf and the best cutting power and speed. The first thing to do was a grid. The idea was to vary the speed and power of the laser and figure out which combination would produce the best results.
Since it was a 8 by 8 grid, I decided to do 12, 25, 37, 50, 62, 87 and 100 for the values. In the case of power, this is a percentage, in the case of speed, it is mm/s.
So even though several combinations worked, I prioritized the fastest, which is 37 mm/s at 87% power.
For the kerf test, I made a design that was just a series of square holes and squate tabs. The middle square and tab was 10mm, and the size increased towards the right and decreased towards the left. The idea was to measure the cut vs the real value and see which tabs fit which holes to confirm.
After measuring every tab, we can say the kerf is 0.1mm.
Confident in the parameters to use in the XTool P2, I turned to the next fun stuff. I originally was very ambitious. I wanted to make one of those animal puzzles. And I wanted the pieces to actually shape a different animal as well, a very different one. In my head, I could make a giraffe and the neck pieces could become a tail, so I was making sketches of how I could make a kit that could be a giraffe when assembled one way and a lizard in another. I started researching how the puzzles are made but promptly realized the CAD design of organic shapes is currently beyond me. I shifted into a brand new idea, which was making a globe, and I wanted it to be able to unfold into a flat map. I needed it to be somehow flexible so the projection would work out.
I started brainstorming how to do this, and how the continents needed to look in order ot be unfolded into a flat shape. I kept thinking about this 3D printed map I had seen online. But that one was too simple, I felt, since it was just rolling up while i wanted to make a real sphere. I looked into how to design the bend radius and make lattices and other helpful resources online. I realized before I could even begin to worry about the shapes of the continents, I had to make a ball that would unfold.
When I started designing, I immediately pivoted into something new. What if the whole ball could be created with one single type of piece? So this is the work I did moving forward, aiming to use a single flat piece to make a whole (aproximation of a) sphere.
I made sure to have the parameters for the material thickness, slots and kerf. This way, I could easily switch material and still use the same design with slight tweaks.
I made a piece that could slot into two others on each end and flex in the middle. There wasn't a lot of thought going into it which was a mistake becasue I made it so the ends were at a 120 degree angle, very confident that what I needed to create was hexagons.
I started cutting the design with slight tweaks on the kerf and slot size, hoping to find the right tolerance for the cardboard to stick together.
I had to change the slot shape into a T, to make sure they would stay together a bit more. This was very hard because in reality, only a very thin layer of cardboard existed, the rest was mostly empty space. Because of this, the slots would slide out and into the empty space. I am sure if I had been working with a material like MDF or acrylic, in which the entire thickness is made up of material, I wouldn't have had as many issues getting it to work. I chose the design with the T because it had a higher capacity of snagging together. I starte making a lot of them, again, with very little thought- even though I could've done some math to figure out how many vertices and that it was actually going to be pentagons and not hexagons.
That point was moot anyway because it would not hold its shape. The slots kept sliding of each other, even through the tight fit, simply because I was trying to hold two very thin pieces of material just by friction. This forced me to use a liberal amoount of tape to keep them all together.
That point was moot anyway because it would not hold its shape. The slots kept sliding of each other, even through the tight fit, simply because I was trying to hold two very thin pieces of material just by friction. This forced me to use a liberal amoount of tape to keep them all together. Speaking with the TAs, like Quentin and Alfonso, helped me decide that I needed to minimize the amount of joints. I unfolded the whole ball then into one single piece of flat carboard that could fold into this dodecahedron, getting closer to my original idea of a a flat turning into a sphere.
This was a much more aesthetically pleasing cut. The assembling wasn't as hard as I feared. However, once put together, it did have a much more flat vibe to it. I probably needed to add some additional bending in the triangles that held three vertices together.
Staring at the all-in-one shape made me realize that there was actually a pattern made up of 4 of the original pieces assembled together in a vaguely Y pattern. I realized with 7 of these and 2 lose units I could recreate the dodecahedron again. So I did.
In the end I got these three versions of the dodecahedron- made out of 30 one-unit designs, 7 four-unit + 2 one-unit, and one single piece of thirty-unit. It was a fun excersize to have some bend and some fun and maybe someday I'll make it again out of a more solid material to see if my theory holds true.
The other thing we needed to work on this week was vynil. I have used vynil cutters in general and also Cricut brand specifically, so it was an easy task for me. I wasn't sure what to make, but an easy idea was just some swag from my research group. I am new to the group and I see older members have stickers and sweaters and I want to feel included too. So I grabbed the logo from one of our shared folders and uploaded it to it to the Cricut Design Studio.
It was very easy to set up, I just needed to cut the edges of the logo. I decided to cut both black and white so I could layer them either way.
I cut the vynil so it would fit into the tray of the Cricut machine without needing the cutting mat. Then I loaded it up, and cut a whole row in black, and then again in white.
Once cut, I peeled the vynil off from what I didn't want and then used the transfer tape to layer one color on top of the other. I tried moving only the white letter, and also tried layerd the black background on top. I think moving the background is easier to line up but can get wrinkled easier so the letter are easier to maneouver.
Literally just realizing I put it the wrong way up in my stuff. F. The S goes on the bottom, and the letters point up. I id say I'm new here, maybe in a couple weeks I will remember details like this.
And I have enough extras to remove and put on again, so I will do that.