For the metal cutting project, I decided to create an infinite diamond illusion.
Steps:
- Create your diamond shape and cutout via Adobe Illustrator.
- Use the water jet cutter to cut out two identical pieces of aluminum.
- Use a file to smooth the initial sharp edges of the aluminum.
- Sand your pieces using sandpaper grit ranging from 60 to 320.
- Create a vinyl sticker that would serve as a mask during sandblasting.
- At this point, I realized that the illusion would only work if the edges of the diamond were cut off
- Thus, I used a Dremel cutter and trimmed off the edges
- Apply the vinyl stickers.
- Sandblast the pieces evenly.
- Apply gloss clear coat.
- Shortcomings: during drying, one of the diamonds got contaminated with black paint from neighboring pieces on the drying rack
Final Product:
Cost:
- Materials:
- $15 / 1×1 ft sheet of aluminum
- $1.00 / 8.5 x 11” sheet of vinyl sticker
- $6.19 / can of clear gloss spray paint
- Time:
- $7.25 * 5 hours = $36.25
TOTAL: $58.44 (for both diamonds)
The cost definitely would be much lower if I didn’t spend so much time with trial and error while designing the vinyl.