For this assignment we chose a wooden machine and were created an adobe illustrator file of the individual parts so that we can laser cut them in the future. I chose the ‘Camshaft Valve.’

Here is my final design, it consists of 6 parts. The top left part was the easiest to create and essentially consisted of a circle above a rectangle. The two cam designs on the top left each were made with a larger circle above a smaller circle which were then connected by a line on each side.

The bottom three parts were more complicated, and I inserted many guidelines to help me create them more accurately. The above picture is of the bottom right design. I created a circle for the bottom wedge and drew two radii, which I mirrored across the central line, in order to find the ends of the wedge.

These were all the guidelines I used to create the bottom half of the part with four circles. I drew the three initial circles, then four horizontal lines that marked the tops and bottoms of the curved connecting rod. I also drew two vertical lines that divided the connecting rods in half.

These were the guidelines I used for the other connecting rod of this part. I drew a line through the centers of the two circles, as well as two parallel ones that marked the narrowest parts of the connecting rod.

The last piece I drew mainly freehand because it didn’t have much of a defined geometric shape.

This was the design that I was trying to emulate in adobe illustrator.