For our final individual project, we were tasked with using the CNC mills to cut out different shapes using wood. I wanted to do the Dallas Cowboys logo for my shape, but the closest I could get to it was a star shape with an outline from the Noun Project. This project was fairly straightforward, and I ran into very few problems.
I started this project by finding my shape on the Noun Project and downloading the SVG file from the website. From there, I created the cutting patterns using the given software and loaded them into the CNC mill. The wood I used was fairly thick, so I had to change out the drill bit on the mill for a longer one. I then secured my piece of wood to the mill, zeroed the bit, and let the machine run.
Zeroing the drill bit
The final cut pieces
After the pieces were cut, there was still some excess wood, so I went ahead and sanded them down. Once I was satisfied with the sanding, I decided to spray paint the pieces using a blue spray paint.
The final sanded pieces
The final painted pieces
In terms of cost, a 1×3 in piece of wood that is 8ft long costs around $2.64 according to Home Depot. Since I only use around 6in of total length, I would estimate the wood material to cost roughly $.16. The full can of spray paint I used costs around $6.48 from Home Depot, and since I didn’t use a lot of it, I would estimate the cost of paint to be around $.10. In total I would expect the total cost of both pieces to be around $.26.
