Heath's Projects

heath · November 23, 2019, 2:13pm

First two projects using the MPCNC.

This is a hot glue gun holder for my youngest daughter. She loves crafting with her hot glue gun, but the plywood block she sets it on has become a mess. I was throwing this together for her in the shop yesterday (scrap red oak) and needed to make a recess for the tile, but my chisels were in desperate need of sharpening. Instead of taking the time to sharpen them, I instead took the time to make the file to cut it out with the CNC. Horses are her main love, so I also added that decoration. With all the computer work, the test cuts, and final cutting time, this 30 minute project turned into an all day project, but it was a day well spent learning.

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My oldest daughter has a new obsession with a South Korean boy band called BST. This is artwork related to a series of album covers or something. 1/4" MDF spray painted black.

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vicious1 · November 23, 2019, 10:18am

Those are some cool projects, and use all of the CNC basics. Cool!

racerflea · November 23, 2019, 10:18am

Man those look great heath! Soon your gonna need a new tab on your website!

heath · November 23, 2019, 2:34pm

So I’m a big nerd, geek, kid, whatever. I just made this little wall hanger display thingy to accompany my GI Joe collection. Super simple project. I referenced a vintage card back for a Cobra soldier and drew it up in Inkscape (importing the actual Cobra emblem from elsewhere). The basic shape was a simple cut on 1/4" MDF with the MPCNC, then paint (the most difficult part of the process), then the letters and Cobra emblem done with my wife’s vinyl cutter. The lettering is not an exact match, but close enough I think. The original was probably hand drawn, but I was using text on a path.

Just for the experience, I added a tool change to the operation, making the first cut with a 1/8" bit, then the finishing pass with a 1/16" bit. I need to make some adjustments to the tool change gcode in Estlcam, or just abandon that process and make each tool its own gcode file. It’s all part of the learning process.

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vicious1 · November 23, 2019, 10:22am

I had some GIJoe’s as a youngster. That brings back some memories!

heath · November 23, 2019, 2:34pm

What was supposed to be a Christmas present for my wife almost ended up being a Valentine’s gift instead. Inkscape again to make the shapes and the text. The text was engraved first, then the shapes cut out from a piece of cedar. Then pocketed the same shapes on a seasoned piece of, I think, pine. The cedar parts were painted black, then the paint sanded off leaving the paint in the recessed letters. Then they were coated with spray on poly.

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The design idea came from a project I think I may have seen here, but I can’t find the original that influenced this.

vicious1 · November 23, 2019, 10:22am

WOW!!! You see this everyone, quick make one for that special someone.

The is an awesome use of contrasting colors and textures. Looks great.

mulze32 · November 23, 2019, 10:22am

Heath, how did you go about painting the MDF and seal the edges on the sign? It all looks great btw.

heath · November 23, 2019, 10:22am

I used spray paint. A base coat of white and two coats of yellow. The only sanding was some quick sanding with 320 grit Abranet mesh after the first yellow coat. I didn’t seal the edges. It was a rushed paint job, but I shared pics in a Joe FB group and have some orders for more, so I’ll take my time on those and do it right. I’ll seal the edges with glue and properly sand.

mulze32 · November 23, 2019, 5:28pm

Great thank you very much! That is very useful.

heath · November 23, 2019, 5:28pm

Did I price this too low? I advertised it today in one of the larger GI Joe buy/sell/trade Facebook groups for $20 plus shipping, and I’ve got about 15 orders now. That was a lot more orders than I expected!

vicious1 · November 23, 2019, 10:25am

Sounds like it. Time is probably your largest cost. I would say fill as many as you can and up the price to compensate you properly for your time. Doing things in batches can really make you efficient though!

niget2002 · November 23, 2019, 5:28pm

I was just debating if I could call in sick tomorrow to knock something like this out

vicious1 · November 23, 2019, 5:28pm

Duh!!! There is no way this would not score some serious points!

heath · November 23, 2019, 2:50pm

I’ll even share my SVG…

Me-Us-You.zip (9.88 KB)

heath · November 23, 2019, 4:38pm

Knocked this out earlier this afternoon. I started with a screen grab from Google Maps, processed through Gimp, Inkscape, and EstlCam. I use the laser to engrave the map and the big text, then switched to the spindle to cut out the lake. Then glued to another board painted blue.

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My wife is setting up a booth at a local festival selling her shirts and other stuff. Hopefully someone will want to buy it.

kdcarnes · November 23, 2019, 10:45am

Nice!

heath · December 5, 2019, 6:15am

Lake art update. After sitting at the festival booth all day without anyone even giving the lake art a second glance, a woman who lives on the lake stopped by and fell in love with it. She asked the price and quoted her half what I was thinking about asking for it because I was just happy someone liked it.

I figured that would be it. But, a picture shared on Facebook lead to a friend placing an order as a birthday gift for her husband. They have a cabin on the lake and she wanted it customized with a marker showing the location of their cabin. She liked it so much, she wanted another one for herself. Friends of theirs saw it and wanted one as well. All total, she ordered an additional 5 more, but wanted them larger. The original was about 10x16 and she wanted 16x20. So now I have two size options to offer. I just delivered her 5 yesterday and I’ve got 3 more orders in the pipeline. I have other area lakes I want to do, but just haven’t had time to make a prototype for them. I really wish I had more than the occasional weekend to spend in my shop.

vicious1 · December 6, 2019, 4:28am

What a wonderful turn of events. They look amazing hopefully they keep that word of mouth going!

heath · May 6, 2020, 2:46pm

I thought I was going to have all sorts of time at home to work on some CNC projects during quarantine, but that hasn’t really been the case. How is it that I haven’t gone anywhere for 6 weeks, but have still been so busy??

Anyway, I did put this together a couple days ago. It’s a gift for our pastor, commissioned by another member of our church (I refused any payment, of course). When the virus hit, our small church moved online like many others. But on Sunday morning we have “drive-in” service. We stay in the parking lot, in our cars, windows rolled up and listen to the pastor on FM radio, very similar to drive-in theater. It’s nice to be AT the church for service and to see other people, even if it is through 2 layers of car windows. I’m not a hugger and never liked the “hug your neighbor” part of the service, so waving from a distance works just fine for me even without a pandemic. But I digress.

The MPCNC was used with the diode laser attachment to burn the image into a thin piece of plywood. The frame around it is red oak, the only hardwood I have enough to do anything with. I took the picture of our church sign with my phone, used Gimp to process it and create the overall image, and “image2gcode” to create the gcode for the laser.