So another week means we have another project that I get to work on, this time the focus is on getting to use the plasma cutter to produce two similar diamond pieces with a unique cutout. After a little thinking, I opted for having a rocket shape in my diamond or as we call them ‘Rocets”. Therefore, I went online and downloaded a cool but simple rocket shape as an svg and and added it to the diamond template we had from canvas on Adobe Illustrator.

Next up, after finalizing my design was to actually cut out the shape using the plasma cutter from a steel plate, this was relatively straight forward because there were step by step instructions in the machine shop on how to run it. The not so great part was having to dip my hands into the murky water to fish out my piece after finishing cutting it out, I had 4 identical diamond rocets for the sake of redundancy if I messed something up during post processing. Next up was using the angle grinder to remove the metal slag from the edges of the diamond. I also used a file to try and get rid of some of the really sharp inner edges of the rocket cutout.

Because the sandblaster in the woodhop was broken, I decided to just sand the pieces with sandpaper which was tiring but I didn’t really have alternatives. After this, I decided to use the black spray paint my pieces black as a nice final finish to give the final look. As a bonus I also was able to have the rocket cutouts as a personal decorative piece for my room. My one regret is not taking more pictures as I was doing this project but all in all it was still a very fun undertaking.

Costs

Steel – $15

Spray Paint – $10

Labor – 5 hours @$7.5/hour – $37.5

Workshop rental – 2 hours @ $12/hour – $24

Total = $86.5