Milling about

This week we worked on using the desktop milling machines. We designed a dog tag that we would mill using a simple 2d design. We also designed a chocolate mold that we would mill using the larger desktop milling machine. The process for this was more complicated as you had to use a cam file from fusion instead of just a 2d file from correl. The workflow for starting the larger milling machine on the wax was also more difficult.

Dog tag

The first thing I did this week was to design my dog tag in notability, this was a rough sketch of what it would be, based off the character gudetama.

The design I found was based on one I found online, which I used to trace the bitmap in corel. All I had to do in corel was change the page size, import the template file, and scale the image to fit into the template. When I imported the template into the actual milling machine, before I imported it, I had to remove the template or else the template would also mill, which is not what I wanted to happen. This was only a slight issue, because now I had to maneuver the file in the bantam software in order to mill in the correctly place I had set up my image. I then followed this workflow to actually mill the design.

Milling workflow

Vacuum out the machine

Turn on the machine

Home the machine

Materials are in the bins to the right of the milling machines

Grab your bit

Open bantam software and select change bit

Take off all the acrylic side

Place down the foam pad to prevent bit damage

Loosen the bit using the 2 tools

Pace your bit into the bold, and tighten it with your hands until it is solidly in place

Tighten with the tools again, once firm give one more good press.

Select the tool you are using in the menu of the software, and move the tool until the bit is over a clear spot on the bed

Place the tape onto the material, and remove the backing.

Then measure the material, use calipers to measure the dimensions of your tool width is x, height is y and thickness is z

Select loading in the software

Place in the very left corner of the bed

Make sure the file is in millimeters

Upload it into bantam

Change the material to the dimensions that were measured before.

Change placement to be at the left bracket

Rehome

Select cut out

If using text convert text to curves

Export as an svg

Open the file in bantam software

Turn off cut out in the design

Change placement by about 15 in x and 6 in y

When ready select mill all visible and select ok after ensuring all acrylic panels were on the machine.

After you are done milling, vacuum out the mill before taking out your milled piece

Use a scraper to remove the mill

Click unload

Final dogtag

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The only issue I had with this was that part of the milled portion didn't mill super clean, but it is very hard to tell that that is even the case.

Milling the dogtag

Milling the wax

Milling the wax was not that difficult. In order to do this you first have to create your design in fusion, and set up a tool path in order to allow for the milling machines to run correctly. First I dimensioned my piece of wax, then I began the design, the design was simple so it made it easy to create. This was the design I made in notability

The next part of doing this was to design it in fusion, which was simple as I said above, all I did was a series of cut extrusions in order to get the shape I wanted. This is what the final design looked like when I designed it in fusion.

Now that we had the shape we could generate the toolpath. Here is where I encountered some issues. I tried to generate the toolpath originally, but it didn't work, which was unfortunate. Then I tried again but changed some settings which did actually work! I had to select 3D toolpath, which was not something I had done before. I could now export the toolpath to the milling machine.

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Instructions from Mrs. Morrow on how to mill the wax

I followed these instructions given to us by Mrs. Morrow in order to mill our wax.

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Timelapse of milling

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Final milled design

Now the mill had finished, there was lots of residue left on the wax, which we vaccuumed up before removing it from the bed. We pulled the wax off and this was what it looked like

This turned out really well, except you could still see the path the machine took on the bottom of the mold. Unfortunately I don't think there is anything we could do to fix this, unless we used a smaller bit.

Cutting the box

To make our box design, Colin and I found a design on the internet, which would assemble fully without glue. In Corel draw we traced the bitmap, which gave us a rough outline of what would need to be vectored. We set this bitmap to a hairline for easier separation when cutting on the laser cutter. Next we made a small set of score marks on the inside, which we made a different color to what we would vector, so it could be easily controlled as to what would cut. The next thing we made was a logo, and we traced that bitmap, and made that yet another different color. now we could cut this. We used color mapping in order to separate the three different opperations. Here is what the final design looked like flat.

Final box with chocolates

Final box

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Cutting the box out