Laser cutting

This week we have learned about another very useful fabrication technique: laser cutting. Essentially, it’s a subtractive manufacturing technology (as opposed to the additive nature of 3D printing) that uses a high-power laser beam to cut flat-sheet materials.

For my model, I chose to create a bowling pin composed of five “sections,” each connected by nine discs. The models were exported with a kerf of 0.2 mm in mind. You can find the CAD file here.

The material I opted for is cardboard, primarily due to its affordability and ease of handling. I used an Epilog Fusion laser cutter. For the settings, I selected a speed of 70%, power of 100%, and frequency of 50%.

The finished pin looks like this:

Assembling it was a bit challenging. Perhaps the tolerances could have been set higher, as cardboard is generally quite forgiving. Maybe I'll also make a ball so we can actually bowl! 😊