Welcome back to another FIREEEE blog post. Tonight we made a box using a laser cutter that fits together without any adhesive. Lets get into it.

 

So initially I wanted to do the intermediate difficulty, so I was scrolling through the files and couldn’t decide on two because they all looked really cool. But at the very bottom, I saw an object that combined multiple designs. So I went with that. Put it into adobe illustrator and hit print and it actually printed perfectly. But because it had hinges, I went to bend it and it snapped completely in half.

After spending 20 minutes waiting for that to cut and pressing the button over and over, I was just done. So I went down to the beginner assignment. I printed and measured the kerf.

Making sure to divide the measurement by 10. I got .0187 in. Then I printed the box out, inputting the kerf measurements and we got ourselves a box.

However, when putting it together, again I broke it. It must be because I bench 225. It doesn’t look pretty, but it’s put together and, you know what, thats what matters at the end of the day right?

 

What we learned

When inputting the kerf measurement, make it slightly larger so that the pieces fit together well. When messing with wooden hinges, remember that wood is very, very fragile. If you accidentally engrave the full piece, you can leave it there, remove the engraved parts from your file, and vector cut it out.

 

COST

One sheet of plywood – $21.40

2 Hours of labor at $21 an hour – $42.00

Total: $63.40