7. Computer-controlled machining

1. Open VCarve and select open an existing file.

2. Select the DXF file of your pieces.

3. The default material panel will appear. Here we will edit the size of our job's workspace, and the origins .

The size I selected was a Length (x) of 1220 mm, Height (y) 2440 mm and a Width (z) of 12 mm.

4. With the command M, I moved my pieces, then I rotated them to fit the workspace. For the missing pieces I will repeat the procress an create a different toolpath for another plywood board.

5. Then I selected the Join Vectors tool, that will close all the open vectors I have (this is important for the next step).

6. Select the "Create Fillet" tool, and select the dog-bone fillet.

Apply the fillet to the internal edges, these will help us in our assembly process.

7. Select the vector of the toolpath you want to create, and select profile toolpath.

When you create a tool path there are 4 main configurateions we are gpoin to change. The blue one is for the depth of the cut, the grren section for the tool type, the orange to mecanize the vectors, and the yellow for adding pads.

In the blue section as inicial depth I wrote 0 mm and for the final depth 12.8 mm (the final depth needs to be a bit higher that the width of our material so it cut its completely). Then on the orange section I choose the outside option.

For the tool type, I selected an end mill of 1/4", for the cutting parameters I chose 0.1" pass depth, a 40% step over. Then for feeds and speeds I used a Splinde Speed of 18000 r.p.m, a feed rate of 450 inch/min and a plunge rate of 23.622 inch/min, which give us a chip load of 0.0125 inches.

To calculated the chip load I used a web calculator. Here, I changed the feed rate to get a chip load that was in the range of softwood with a 1/4" tool.

Then I added tabs so the material doesn't move once the cut is finished. You can add the manually or automatically.

After all the parameters are done, I clicked on calculate, it will appear a warning message saying that the final depth surpaces the material width (dont worry is normal, and we have a sacrifice table down our final material).

Now that I have the outside toolpath, I did repeated the steps and did another tootpath but changed the direction to the inside.

Now that I have the Outside toolpath, I did another tootpath but for the inside elements for that I changed the direction to inside.

Then I created a pocket toolpath for the elements.

Here I change the final depth to 6mm. We can also edit the step over % of our tool to change the separation between the pocket toolpath.

For this exercise, this was the router we used.

1. First we need to turn the CNC machine on.

2. Then we add our material, and secure it with nails.

3. Remember to use your security equipment (Boots, lab coat, security glasses and earmuffs)

3. Then we turned on the PC, and added a usb with our file (March 2/3 Arc .txt)

4. We open our file, and we will see the toolpaths. But before running the program we need to set the x,y,z origins.

For the Z, I moved the tool to the center and moved the Z axis until it touched my material. Once it was done, I set it as my zero, then moved it upwards.

After that, I moved the tool to the right bottom corner, to determine my x and y. Once it was adjusted I set them as my origin. I liberated the mergency button and start the cut.

Here is a video of how it runned

Remember to vacumm the dust when necessary and when you are donde to maintain a clean area and prevent fire accidents.

1. Once our pieces are cutted, we need to sand them because of the wood shavings.

Here is the difference between two pieces

2. Somewhere in my toolpath process I omitted two joints for the pivots of the table, and I realized after cutting the pieces so I ended up doing by hand.

To do so, I took the reference measures from my CAD model, the I troce the section to be removed and with a chisel & a hammer, I started removing the material, until I had a hole.

Then with a bastard file, to remove material and even the cut.

With that I could join the pieces together.

Another issue I found, was that I didn't configure correctly the nocth.

So I ended using a chisel, and sanded the are afterward.

Here is a speed video of how I joined the pieces, because I used 0 tolerance and the wood was a little bit warped, some joints were to tight, so with the file I removed material and with the hammer I applied force.

Here I am with the finished piece.