15. Wildcard Week

Assignment

Design and produce something with a digital process not covered in another assignment, documenting the requirements that your assignment meets, and including everything necessary to reproduce it. Possibilities include but are not limited to wildcard week examples.

Clo 3d

This week I have tried to use Clo, a fabric based software wear you can animate designs and use avatars as models for your fabric designs. Unfortunately my mac book really doesn't seem to be able to process the software, each time I try to import a file it crashes. Instead I have used fusion to design a cushion for a chair I had designed, but have not yet built due to my knee operation.

Fortunately michelle saved the day .

file import fbx settings align bottom to ground and z up to set orientation Importing materials from libraries. Divide mesh, makes mesh smaller.

• Tac on obj (tac on avatar)
• edit tac to determined point
• Polygon to make 2D shape from point to point, making one half of the cushions first.
• Edit patter, clicking on all of the lines around the perimeter of the cushion
• then click rectangle button and press back into the field
• then set rectangle sizes
• right click, symetric pattern - these items becomes mirrored, editing one size will change the other.
• Now we have three pieces
• Align the fabrics so the grey part are facing inwards
• Segment sewing, for sewing between point
• free sewing, choosing sewing path with mouse
• Reverse sewing tool if the orientation isn't correct
• right click on pattern piece - freeze and then simulate so that piece stays
• property editor - pressure set at 2 for this cushion, if the pressure is too high it may fly away, lol.
• Collision thickness can remove the space between the fabric and the fbj in the render.
• seem setting - fold angle outwards
• Hi-resolution settings for final render

Global 3900 AUT

The Global 3900 AUT is an industrial, high speed, single needle lock stitch sewing machine with head motor.
I have very little experience sewing, so I asked Laura to run me through the basics and some safety features to prevent me poking holes in my hands. I also had a brief flick through the safety sheet in the manual, the main point are listed below.

The manual also states that only trained operators who have conducted the relevant safety and operation training should use the machine, it also highlights the risk of slight to serious injury and possible death! O.M.G! I thank you Laura, your 15 minute masterclass could have saved my life.

Operation

The sewing machine was built for speed and so only operated in two directions, forwards and reverse which as the name states is used for locking the stitching in place. From the key pad we can choose different options for lock stitching and set the machine so that your thread doesn't pull through. If you don't select the option, you can also lock stitch free hand by using the button marked with a zig zag at the right of the needle, or alternatively by using the lever on the right of the stich sizing wheel.
Stich length is set by the grey wheel marked 0 to 4 on the front of the machine, this determines the length in millimeters up to a maximum of 4mm.

To start and stop the machine we use the very sensitive foot pedal, pressing down and forward to sew and down and backwards to stop, cut and lift the needle off the material. There is also a knee pad under the desk that will lift the needle to allow you to feed in the material.

To thread the machine it is best practice to use the current thread, tie the new yarn onto it and pull through until you reach the needle. Otherwise you can use the photo above, taken from the manual, as a reference on how to thread the machine.

laser cut template

As my design was in fusion, I used that same design to make a template I could use to measure the material. After editing the chair design slightly, I exported an stl file. With that file, I used the laser cutter to cut the template out of card. With the template on the material (a nice tropical shirt I soured from Waterloo market), I could chalk around to template leaving a bit extra around the edges to account for the infill.

Sewing

I wanted to keep the tropical shirt look, so I used some of the material to cover the neck area and use the button to add the infill. I lined up the pattern and used pins to secure in place before sewing closed the opening. This was the trickiest part and I could probably have just used the other parts of the shirt.

Infill

I used a recycled polyester infill, taken from an old pillow I had at home. Quite a simple task of feeding it in through the button hole and closing the shirt up after. I think the actual feel of the pillow would be better if the inside also had a cover that was somewhat shaped to the design.

Shotbot CNC

The cushion idea came about because of a chair I had designed but not yet build so I will document some of the work flow here as well as my big build week.

From the mistakes made previously and due to the design, it was very important to get the milling order right, working from inside to out there was the seat, inner chair and outer chair in one piece and some smaller points that had to be isolated in V-carve first. We used bigger tabs to play it safe, 4mm thick and 8mm wide.

Milling went well this time around, just one small issue, when isolating the back of the seat section of the chair, I did not create a new toolpath and thus this action was missing. It was easy to resolve the next morning in V-carve.

Once milled I sanded the chairs and prepared the parts for assembly. To connect the outer chair to the inner frame I used hinges from a hardware store. To get the flush I marked them in position and then used a chisel to remove the top layer of wood. To connect the seat to the inner frame I used 6mm bolts with wooden inserts hammered in. When drilling through the side of the wood I was careful to clamp the sections in the vice between to spare pieces of plywood and start with a 3mm wood drill bit working up to 7mm, I did that to prevent wood splitting.

After sanding and fixing I could test the chair, you can see the results below. You have to be brave to sit down, I will need to make some adjustments to where the seat sits on the frame to make it more sturdy.

Then to see if the chair fits in the table...

Reflection

I feel like I have done a lot this week, but from trying to catch up rather than exploring a new process. My option were limited and became even more so when the software crashed. The pillow came out ok, but I made some errors in the order it was sewn together and have made a double stich at the bottom to keep everything in. Ideally I could have made it so that all of the stitching went on the inside. I should also have ironed the shirt before hand, that would have made it easier to work with.

Files

wildchair

Learning outcomes

• Demonstrate workflows used in the chosen process
• Select and apply suitable processes (and materials) to do your assignment.

Have you answered these questions?

• Documented the workflow(s) and process(es) you used [x]
• Described problems encountered (if any) and how you fixed them [x]
• Included original design files and source code []
• Included ‘hero shot’ of the result [x]