Pocket aces | ENGI 210: Prototyping and Fabrication

For this last homework of the year I chose to do the beginner level, as I had never used the CNC machine before.

To start I chose a design I liked for my piece using Noun Project. I chose the ace of spades as I thoght it was original, and it could be cut properly with the CNC machine without taking too much time.

Once I had my file, I followed the instructions in the assignment to make my design ready to be cut using Carbide Create. First I chose a piece of wood that met the homework requirements. Then, I decided to do two contour cuts, one for the offset vector to go all the way through, and another one to set the limit of the card. This way, I would achieve a piece which would look like a wood frame with the card inside it. Moreover, I chose a pocket cut for the inner shapes of the card (the spades), so that they would differenciate from the rest of the card.

Once my file was ready, I kept following the homework’s instructions to cut it in the machine. The cutting time was of 27 minutes, and I had no issues with it, so I was able to have my two pieces cut within an hour.

Once the machine process was done, it was time to post-process. For this I first used a hand saw to complete cutting my shape out of the wood, which was easy to do as the machine had done most of the job (there was only a thin layer of wood left). Then, I realized that the small spades of the cards were not cut as shown in my file; this was probably because I used a bit that was too big for this cut. However, I decided not to recut the pieces, as I thought the semi-cut spades looked like hearts, so I could make my card have two suits (spades and hearts). This was even better considering that I had two copies of the same card, and this way they could represent pocket aces, the best hand in poker (hence the title of my post).

After this decision, I sanded my pieces to make them smooth, and to make the back even (as I was using it to represent a wooden frame for the card). I also sanded the front of the card to make the paint look better in it.

Once this was done it was time to paint my cards. For this I first tried to use white spray paint for the background and acrylic paint for the inner shapes. However, when I started using the spray paint, I realized that there was almost nothing left and it would not be enough to cover my whole cards. Therefore, I used acrylic paint for the entire design of the cards. The hardest part here was to paint the small hearts, as I had to be very careful not to accidentally paint the background of the card too.