computer-controlled cutting

cut something in the vinylcutter

link to design files

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vinylcutter

How I did it


1. I drew the eyes and the teeth of the toy tha i will cut in Illustrator using the circles and the pen tools.

2. Then build the archive with different scales of the pieces.

Then.....

the vinylcutter machine

3. Setting off the vinyl sheet in the vinylcutter Model Mimaki CG60SRIII machine
4. Her is a zoom of the sensor that detects the vinyl sheet in the machine
5.Then the machine pulls back and forward the vinyl sheet to get the size of it
6. Then the settings of the file
7. File settings
8. Changing the file color and size
9. Then adjusting the speed and the Press settings . Speed in 4 and press in 80g
10. Detail of the settings window
11. Finally the adjustments were stablished at 10cm/s Speed and 80g of pressure
12. Other reference of settings when cutting typography........
13. And then the machine starts to cut
14.Finally we have the pieces cut out
15. And finally putting the "transfer" over the vinyl so we can apply it into a surface.
16. Removing the transfer.
Hero Shot, I stick one of the little ones in the back my tablet.

computer-controlled cutting

lasercutter construction kit

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lasercutter

How I did mine , and the link to the group assignment is: FabLabCDMX.


For the base press fit kit We start drawing a path in side view, a perimeter of the base with the design we need to fit our requeriments of seatting or just lie down
And with a 2 side revolution we give volume to the original path.
  the we add the rotation system at the top of the base and the center rod. In the inside of the base  we need to fit the servo, batteries and the PCB so we draw a rectangular prism simulating the space that this components will occupy.
The next step is, with a bolean operation, to substract the rectangular prism from the volume of the base.
Then export it as a STL file and open it in "slicer fo fusion360", this is a so easy to use software that creates this Interlocked Slices by itself and you just need to set some simple parameters like the quantity of pieces in the Axis for example. Another feature of this program is that it gives you the drawings and quantity of boards you need to construct your object and also it includes the ID of each piece that will be engrave with the lasser cut machine so you can identify each one to build your press fit kit in the correct order.
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This a final view of our future base press fit kit with the cardboard render

Here is a zoom image of one of the pieces that will form the base of my project, you can see the assemble cuts where the horizontal pieces will be attached, you can see that the dimension is 4.00 (mm) because I´m intented to use cardboard of 4mm, but, what if I ended up using 5mm or 6mm acrylic or foamboard or another board thickness? Well, thats when parametrycs show their functionality and make our design easy to update, for example, in this case, I mentioned that I will want to use 4mm carboard, so you can see that the dimension is fixed to that parameter: fx 4.00 but you can see that the 3rd slot is wider so we need to fix this.

In the SKETCH mode, first select the dimension tool of the skecth menu and then select the line you want to measure, in my case it ws the vertical one of the 3rd slot (from below)

Then click in the dimension window frame so you can write the name of the parameter you are looking for, first you need to add your parameters.

When you start to write it will appear the parameters that are coincident with the text you are writing, in my case I only have one and it is "espesorcarton" (board thickness)
And now, as you can see the dimension if the line change to fx 4.00, the slots  are all fixed to 4mm
Now let´s imagine that there´s no 4mm cardboard, only 6mm and all aour slots are fixed to 4mm, no problem. In the Modifiy menu go to Change Parameters......
Then a new window will appear wher you can add or modify parameters, here we are going to modify the exist of 4mm and change it to 6mm
When change the Expression to 6, automatically all the fx 4.00 change to fx 6.00 mm, we don´t have to redraw anything, this a simple but didactic example of the wonders of using parametrics
But now, we have a special need: to assemble a different material in just one slot, the rest will remain at 6mm, this new material has a thickness of 7mm, so, again, click in the dimension window frame where we write our parameter and now we are going to add some value, a +1 this means that this new dimension is going to be 7mm because is the SUM of the original parameter of 6 plus 1
And, if in the future we use the same design but with different materials we just need to update the parameter of "espesorcarton" to cut the right slot-thickness
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When we have all the pieces that form the base it´s time cut them in the laser machine. First we need to export the file as a .DWG so we can import it into Autocad, there are some stablished settings like the layer colors that are link to some settings related to the speed and power of the laser cutting machine
Setting up the laser cutting machine control panel, like the scale of the drawing, the "what to plot" section and then the properties
When click in the Properties button, it will pop up this window, this is important because here we can find some prestablished materials that already has their own settup depending in the color of the layer
The color of drawing has info regarding to the speed and power of the laser, also contains info that if it will be cut or engrave, it´s important that you change colors in the autocad window to match the correct properties that you need.
The laser machine cutting the corrugated cardboard
Some tests of the laser cut to check scale, correct assemble, ID, et
Some pieces of the base
Starting to assemble the base
Detail of the ID of this piece
The final base press fit kit assemble