Assignment

• Group assignment:
  • Complete your lab's safety training
  • Test runout, alignment, fixturing, speeds, feeds, materials and toolpaths for your machine
  • Document your work to the group work page and reflect on your individual page what you learned

01 — Safety Considerations

(From memory) Here’s a summarized list of all safety considerations:

No loose accesories Ex: necklace, scarf, kimono belt etc.

Long-hair should be tied.

Only one person should operate the machine (prevent fi activating the machine while someone is changing the drill tip).

Always wear glasses inside the wood workshop, especially with an active cnc machine.

Do not use your hands as tools nor try to reach machines that are active

In case of danger, use the emergency stop button that all machines have

02 — Runout, alignment, fixturing, speeds, feeds, materials and toolpaths test

We tested different clearance rates by cutting U-shaped pieces provided by our instructor Josep. We produced 4 different pieces which had an varying gap width between the pieces arms. This width ranged from -0.40 to +0.20 mm (quite not sure about this number).

We tested different combinations of cut direction (downcut/upcut), milling (conventional/climb) and different feed rates (from 3 to 6k mm/min). We did this by cutting a quadrant-like shape several times, applying different settings each time. This resulted in a total of 32 pieces. We later used these pieces to find our preferred settings on our individual assignments’ cuts.

03 — Machine setup

Our instructors Josep and Dani guided us through the setup process. Here’s a summary of the quadrant-piece cuts:

1. We collected our test plywood board and set it up in the machine, making sure it is aligned with and fully inside the sacrificial layer.

2. We zeroed the cnc by bringing it to the corner of the board.

3. We uploaded the screw placement file and milled the screw holes.

4. We fixed the plywood board to the sacrificial layer by adding a screw in each hole.

5. We re-calculated the zero for the z-axis, since the height of the board could have changed once secured.

6. We then uploaded the toolpath file for the downcut pieces and proceeded to make the cuts.

7. After the cuts, we changed the tool tip to an upcut one.

8. We then uploaded the toolpath file for the upcut pieces and proceeded to make the final cut.

9. The last step was then removing the screws and sanding the bridges between the pieces and the main layer. We should also fight back our adhdness and store the final pieces somewhere.

Board set and screwn. Preparing the UC files after finishing the DC-piece cut

04 — Results shots