Laser cutting is maybe one of the techniques I wanted to learn the most in this class.
I like wood work a lot, and I think laser cutting is a very useful tool to create models and objects in a very easy and fast way.
For this homework, though, I had to learn Adobe Illustrator which I have not ever used before. I encountered some issues along with my teammate Gloria, trying to print our pieces.
At first the kerf was not optimal, the laser cutter got crazy and did not print in the right place, another time it engraved the lines that were assigned for vector cutting and vector cut the lines that were assigned as engraving…
Then, after 4 tries at least, I asked for help. Turns out the first pieces I printed with kerfs 0.013” and 0.015” were actually very well printed and all I needed was to put (a lot) more pressure onto them to snap them together. For this, I ultimately used a rubber mallet. I wish we did not encounter these issues since we ran out of time, unfortunately. But next time I think we will do a better job, for sure! Now that we know how it works of course.
Some pictures of our design process:
Evidence of our laser cutter running crazy!
One of the final pieces…
The settings I used!
The pieces from the 0.015” box…
I decided to keep the 0.013″ as my submission and Gloria’s 0.013” kerf with modified fingers (0.8115 in):
And my name tag from training with a cute rice bowl!
Cost Analysis
