Milling S3S ...yes, triangles.
Disclaimer: This blog follows my Magen David Board that is already finished and posted here
In Highschool I always doodled (I still am). and one of my favorite things was to use the squares on the math papers to form different geometries - mostly with triangles. as I was playing along, I discovered that I could form a star of david (Magen David) and that formation has stuck with me ever since.
When I was introduced to the idea of making cutting boards out of wood, I always wanted to incorporate my sketches and designs into that.
I finally got a chance to put my ideas into motion, and came up with the following design in SketchUp:
SketchUp TIP: Using components you can quickly see how many of a certain component you have in the model by selecting the component. In the Entity Info, it'll clearly show you that the selected item is a component, and will also show you how many of that such components are in the model.
Using the above model, and the above Tip, I was quickly able to tell that I needed 80 mitered cubes, and 60 regular cubes to make the board. Now it was just a matter of getting it milled.
I figured since the board is mirrored left<->right, I could make strips for half a board twice as thick, and prior to final glue up rip them in half to quicken things up and make alignment easier.
This is where the trouble started .
All the lumber that I have consists of cutoffs and shorts that were left over from a shop that closed, and since I wanted to get the largest possible geometry, my options were rather limited. I did not have full width boards that I could easily bevel rip to size, but had narrow boards that I could only bevel rip in the middle - with the hopes of using both parts - I was that limited with lumber….yeah.
My next mistake was approaching this project with automation, and mass production in mind. instead of making many small and clean triangles and glueing them one at a time, I figured I could created long beveled glue ups and quicken the creation of the triangles geometries. looking back - considering my source of lumber, I should have cut a massive amount of perfectly shaped triangles and with patience glue them one at a time.
So, after jointing and planing all the lumber I had could yield squares larger than 1" I bevel ripped them to get the triangles. I left a bit extra width on both sides (as much as I could) as I knew those rips would not be clean and will be in need of a cleanup:
Next was the attempt for cleanup. I made the following sled for the planer which would hold the parts at 45 to plane the top flat while still keeping the essential 45 angle:
As you can see, I was focusing on making things fast, dirty, but efficient. unfortunately this was more dirty and fast than efficient as the lack of full support for the parts made the planer lift the parts as they passed the 2nd roller. so my cleaned and flat planed parts - were not so clean, not so flat, and well … not so so.
All aside, and for lack of any additional lumber suitable for this, I decided to move forward and attend any parts that require it as they call for it. I glued up the beveled strips and got this material that I will work with:
Lessons learned:
Next up, Super Cuts!
Disclaimer: This blog follows my Magen David Board that is already finished and posted here
In Highschool I always doodled (I still am). and one of my favorite things was to use the squares on the math papers to form different geometries - mostly with triangles. as I was playing along, I discovered that I could form a star of david (Magen David) and that formation has stuck with me ever since.
When I was introduced to the idea of making cutting boards out of wood, I always wanted to incorporate my sketches and designs into that.
I finally got a chance to put my ideas into motion, and came up with the following design in SketchUp:
SketchUp TIP: Using components you can quickly see how many of a certain component you have in the model by selecting the component. In the Entity Info, it'll clearly show you that the selected item is a component, and will also show you how many of that such components are in the model.
Using the above model, and the above Tip, I was quickly able to tell that I needed 80 mitered cubes, and 60 regular cubes to make the board. Now it was just a matter of getting it milled.
I figured since the board is mirrored left<->right, I could make strips for half a board twice as thick, and prior to final glue up rip them in half to quicken things up and make alignment easier.
This is where the trouble started .
All the lumber that I have consists of cutoffs and shorts that were left over from a shop that closed, and since I wanted to get the largest possible geometry, my options were rather limited. I did not have full width boards that I could easily bevel rip to size, but had narrow boards that I could only bevel rip in the middle - with the hopes of using both parts - I was that limited with lumber….yeah.
My next mistake was approaching this project with automation, and mass production in mind. instead of making many small and clean triangles and glueing them one at a time, I figured I could created long beveled glue ups and quicken the creation of the triangles geometries. looking back - considering my source of lumber, I should have cut a massive amount of perfectly shaped triangles and with patience glue them one at a time.
So, after jointing and planing all the lumber I had could yield squares larger than 1" I bevel ripped them to get the triangles. I left a bit extra width on both sides (as much as I could) as I knew those rips would not be clean and will be in need of a cleanup:
Next was the attempt for cleanup. I made the following sled for the planer which would hold the parts at 45 to plane the top flat while still keeping the essential 45 angle:
As you can see, I was focusing on making things fast, dirty, but efficient. unfortunately this was more dirty and fast than efficient as the lack of full support for the parts made the planer lift the parts as they passed the 2nd roller. so my cleaned and flat planed parts - were not so clean, not so flat, and well … not so so.
All aside, and for lack of any additional lumber suitable for this, I decided to move forward and attend any parts that require it as they call for it. I glued up the beveled strips and got this material that I will work with:
Lessons learned:
- Do not Mass Produce a One-Of design - not until you are actually mass producing them
- Planer sled should have full base support - I will update my sled to accommodate for that.
- Glueing up beveled strips requires a lot of patience, self control - OR - a set of precut cauls that would hold the parts at the set angle - I didn't have such, and had to rely on patience and self control - good thing I have those at hand, but for future use - I'll make myself some guides.
Next up, Super Cuts!