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Laser cut boxes.

(*steve*)

¡sǝpodᴉʇuɐ ǝɥʇ ɹɐǝɥd
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I've recently gained access to a laser cutter and have used it to make cases for some of my projects.

I found the existing tools on the internet were very limited in the boxes they could create, or required almost everything to me done manually.

I decided to write my own program to help me create boxes and was then encouraged by a colleague to make it available publicly.

In its current form it accepts requests by email and returns cutting profiles that can be used to drive a laser cutter.

If you're interested you can send an email to [email protected] and it will reply with instructions detailing how you can create the box of your dreams.

It's entirely free, but I do request that if you feel a desire to express any thanks you send a donation to my local hackerspace who have been very helpful in assisting me with my various laser projects.

At the moment the program is a very early version, and whilst entirely usable, will probably be subject to numerous changes. Most of the recent changes have been to the help file that you get when you sent a request to the email address above. If you're sufficiently interested and want to make suggestions for improvements or suggest things that are not described well, please either do it here or email the address given in the help file.

If you don't have access to a laser cutter, maybe it's time to check out your local hackerspace(s) and check out what they have :)
 

Arouse1973

Adam
Dec 18, 2013
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I would love to see some pictures of both the cutter and any results you have. What materials have you tried?
Adam
 

(*steve*)

¡sǝpodᴉʇuɐ ǝɥʇ ɹɐǝɥd
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The main materials I have used in the laser cutter are MDF sheeting, Acrylic sheets, and painted copper clad fibreglass (the latter for a different purpose).

Others have cut ply, pine, corflute, paper, denim, leather, rubber stamps, coir doormats(!), and gingerbread (yes, really!).

The major limitation is that the material to be cut does not contain chlorine, or produce noxious smoke. There can be issues with damage to the mirrors, and poisoning of bystanders! (the laser cutters are fitted with extraction fans leading to an outside vent, but even so, some smoke does escape.

For more information on the laser cutters, see http://wiki.artifactory.org.au/doku.php?id=tools:lasercutters:start

The smaller laser cutter is an LG500 and has a cutting bed approx 500mm x 300mm.
The larger laser cutter is an LC1290 with a cutting bed approx 1200mm x 900mm.

The page referenced above has links to the laser parameters for approved materials for each.

They are absolutely great fun to use, but quite capable of starting fires (12mm pine on the larger laser cutter requires a slow cutting speed (2mm/sec). If (using thick natural timber) you accidentally go over the same cut twice, or have two cuts too close to each other, you can get some nice glowing embers. At this point, the high pressure air changes from cooling and removing smoke to providing extra oxygen. At this point you hit the stop button (or the emergency stop button) open the cover and use the small spray bottle to spray a bit of water on the wood. This stuff generally happens at the limits of operation for the device and I have only observed it when a trainer has been trying out something new. Nevertheless, you are required to be with the machine observing it while it operates.

An example of a laser cut box can be seen in this thread. This was produced prior to Boxie. The basic outline was generated using http://www.makercase.com/ and then this was edited for the various holes and engraving required.

I'll take some pictures of some of the "boxes" I've produced while testing Boxie and post them later...
 

(*steve*)

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Here's some pictures of "boxes" produced by Boxie.

IMG_6559 (Small).JPG
The box on the right consists only of "outer" sides. The more complex side on the top right is a 3mm side, a 2mm void, and a 6mm side. This is useful if you want to mount something behind the front panel and you don't want mounting holes in the front panel.

The box on the left has two outer sides on the left (it's a bit hard to see, but they are two 3mm sides). The four sides in the middle of the box are "inner" sides. One reason for inner sides is to provide internal support for heavy items that protrude through a panel. One example might be a PC power supply mounted in the top of a case. It's better to rest it on a shelf than have it hang from a few screws (especially if you have a wooden case).

IMG_6560 (Small).JPG
Here are the boxes from the side showing a major difference between internal sides (on the left) and external sides (on the right).

Multiple external sides have the same width and placement of cuts. This is both aesthetically nicer, and mechanically stronger than the result with internal sides.

The box on the left illustrates that the cuts created for inner sides do not necessarily line up with the cuts for outer sides. If these inner sides were moved very close to the edge of the box, you could easily produce something mechanically unsound. Internal sides give you a lot of flexibility, but also remove some of the protections against making impossible shapes.

IMG_6562 (Small).JPG

In this image the left box shows the advantage of combining multiple outer sides with inner sides. The joins for the inner sides only go into the innermost layer of the outer sides thus giving a far neater appearance to the finished box.

On the right you can see that cuts vary in size between edges. On the left and right they vary because of the material thickness. On the top vs the right they vary because the join is of a different length and a single tab is all that can fit (the minimum size of a tab is determined by the thickness of the material. Note that there are some exceptions for thin slices used for filling gaps).

IMG_6563 (Small).JPG
The simpler box on the right can be taken apart and put back together (the one on the left has joins too tight to be disassembled!).

This image shows the blackened edges you get on MDF. I think this is mostly caused by the glue used to bind the material.

Pine can produce a nicer edge (very little charring) up to the point where cutting is very slow and things go pear shaped. The disadvantage with cutting natural timber is that the grain can affect the cut, and so the edges may not be perfectly perpendicular.

For acrylic, the edges are smooth and almost mirror-like.

IMG_6564 (Small).JPG

The same pieces from overhead. The two on the right are the 6mm pieces.

This was actually the first box I cut with Boxie and I impressed myself at the time with the complexity that can be generated by the application of a few simple rules.

These pieces are also a great thing to give to someone with the instructions to "use them to make a box". (It's my current party trick -- yes, I am a pretty sad case.)
 

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