For this week’s project, we worked on laser cutting and etching. I was a little nervous about this project because the training was so quick and I hadn’t used a laser cutter on my own before, but it went very smoothly!

The longest phase was actually the prep work rather than the actual cutting. First, I had some IT issues where I couldn’t log into the computer next to the Epilog machine, but Danny set me up on his account, and IT was able to come by and fix my account later in the day. Once I was logged in, I used the box maker website to start generating a file for a 4″ inch cube with finger joints. I needed to input the thickness of the material, so I found a piece of plywood with enough space left for my box and some testing space, and measured the thickness with calipers. It came out to just over 0.2″ inches. Next, I had to test the kerf of the machine, which meant I also had to test out the power and speed settings I needed to be able to cleanly cut through the material. Our reference material recommended full power and 20% speed for wood 1/4″ thick, so I tried that on a 1″ square, and it cut out very cleanly on the first try, which was very encouraging. There was a slight bit of charring, so I bumped the speed up to 22% and was still able to easily remove my square from the material.

Next, I tested the kerf by drawing ten rectangles in Adobe Illustrator, each with a width of 0.5″. Ideally, the width of these rectangles when pushed together would be 5″. However, the machine’s beam has a thickness that needs to be taken into account. The total width of all the rectangles came out to 4.931″. I divided this number by 20 (the 20 vertical lines needed for these 10 rectangles) and added my kerf of .00345″ to the box maker.

Next step – generating the file and importing into Adobe Illustrator! I added my name and a hibiscus flower that I found on Noun Project. When I started the cut, however, I made a mistake. I forgot to copy and paste my file into a new file with the dimensions of the laser cutter bed, which means the bottom edge of my box never got cut and I couldn’t remove it from the wood.

No biggie, though! I quickly realized the error, and when I moved my file to a bigger template, I had no issues removing the cut pieces. The last step was to put it all together! The finger joints were snug, but not too snug. I was a little worried I was going to snap the sides while pushing them together, but with a few quick pushes I got everything assembled.

Cost analysis:

Cost Type	Cost	Price	Source	Quantity	Total
Materials	1/4″ plywood	$29 for 4’x8′	Home Depot	96 sq inches	$0.60
Labor	Woodworking Operator	$18/hr	Bureau of Labor Statistics	2 hrs 30 mins	$45.00
	Prototyping Engineer or industrial designer	$37/hr	Bureau of Labor Statistics	30 mins	$18.50
Overhead	Facility Cost (Machine Time)	Assume $10000 worth of equipment	FinModelsLab	Assume 10% of equipment costs	$1,000.00