First assembly

It’s been a while since I had any time to work on the Lucky Jim sign but tonight I squeezed in about half an hour to do a few things and make significant progress. I cut a few pieces on the band saw including the two axles and the frame.  I also cut some axles from 1/4″ steel pencil rod and then drilled the holes (slightly off kilter) for the wheels.

The pieces were assembled using five minute epoxy making them plenty strong in a very big hurry. I’ll be adding more details with sculpting epoxy the next time I get some time.

I’ll be mocking up the box on the mine car next along with Lucky Jim. At that point I can determine the size the sign needs to be and I’ll get to sizing the routing files which I’ve already begun.
Stay tuned for more developments…
-dan

Published with permission from precisionboard.blogspot.com. Source.

Dual Nature HDU Sculpture is in the ArtPrize Competition!

If you are anywhere near the Grand Rapids, MI area between now and October 2nd be sure to stop by the local ArtPrize Competition and vote for the “Dual Nature” Precision Board Plus PBLT-15 sculpture by our friends Cecilia Lueza and Rick Munne!

ArtPrize is the worlds largest art competition. Anyone over the age of 18 can be involved, and hundreds of thousands of dollars are given away in prizes, with the first place winner receiving $200,000! Categories consist of two-dimensional, 3-dimensional, use of urban space, time/performance and sustainability. See the history of this competition here.

Be sure to check back on our blog to see how Dual Nature did! You can subscribe to our bi-weekly blog via Facebook or Twitter.

Check out the full story of this sculpture’s history on our original blog: PBLT-15 Sculpture – Dual Nature.

You can also see Cecilia’s homepage here.

 

Extraordinary Designs from Ordinary Concrete: Textured Architectural Concrete by Spec Formliners

Great things are happening at Spec Formliners, manufacturers of formliners, in Santa Ana CA!   It might not be widely known that Precision Board Plus is used in the architectural concrete forming industry. Their end products are molds that attach to the inside of concrete forming systems. When concrete is cast against the form liner, the impression is left in the resulting concrete wall.[/one_third] [divider_padding]

Click on image above to see a short video clip of the lighted freeway underpass

The patterns available are abundant and can range from simple flutes or wood grains to elaborate custom murals such as aquatic life scenes or rolling wave patterns. “Our manufacturing process is simpler, cleaner, and faster because we are able to use our two CNC tables to produce our master molds with Precision Board Plus.  Designs are pre-approved by our customer and then precisely replicated on the CNC in Precision Board, allowing for quality control that was not achievable in the past.” says Drew Deering, Vice President of Engineering.

1. Precision Board Plus being machined 2. Precision Board Plus master mold used to cast formliner (primed in gray) 3. Finished polyurethane formliner ready for customer use.

“We use Precision Board in favor of any other machineable material because of its ease of use.  Precision Board allows for the longest bit life, the fastest machining speeds, and a more uniform finished product than other machining board.  We commonly glue multiple sheets together or order certain thickness of Precision Board in order to meet the specific requirements of a project – something that is not easily achieved in any other material. Additionally, the composition of Precision Board creates a larger, denser particle when machined that settles very quickly, so our employees are not surrounded by a cloud of dust the way they are when we machine MDF,” says Michael Billing, Design Engineer, “We are very concerned with shop environment as well as the satisfaction of our customers.”

For more information on Spec Formliners – give them a call (888-429-9550) or view their web site at www.specformliners.com.

Now they can find us

Yesterday I routed the address marker for the new house. It turned out really nice. The piece will blend perfectly into the other house trim and yet stand out when someone wants to know our house number – not that they won’t know it is our house. The truth is there aren’t many houses like it around here or anywhere I know of.

In the next few days we’ll begin work on the decorative kneesunder the gables. they should be a crative challenge. Stay tuned…
-dan

Published with permission from precisionboard.blogspot.com. Source.

Address marker

Sometimes the files that appear real simple have a lot of steps. Our address sign for the new house was such a piece. It was to be routed from 1.5″ 30 lb Precision Board. The address marker would feature the same heart background as the trim.

It started with the vectors – all created in EnRoute Pro. The lettering was a little light for routing so I used the outline tool to add 0.1″.  I then deleted the original letters.

I then added a border around the letters. The heart vectors were hand placed in a random pattern.

The outer shape was created as a flat relief 0.7″ tall.

I then imported a sandblasted woodgrain bitmap and applied it to the base relief at 0.2″

The inner vector was also made into a flat relief 0’4″ tall.

The hearts would be raised from the background in three layers. I selected the hearts for the first layer one at a time by picking hearts that did not overlap. They were made into flat reliefs reliefs. By leaving them selected when I did the merge they would be easy to locate and delete when we were done with them.

To do the merge I first selected the outline as the base relief.

Then the heart reliefs were selected one at a time and merged to the base relief. I then deleted them before moving on the the next layer.

These steps were repeated two more times for two more heart layers.

 When the heart layer was complete it looked like this.

I then merged the heart layer to the base layer using the replace command.

The lettering border was next. The reliefs were created as flat reliefs. I merged (highest) these reliefs to the base relief.

The numbers were added to the relief using the bevel tool. The base (straight up portion of the letters) was set at 0.2″ high.

The file was now ready for tool pathing and then sent off to the MultiCam. It will be roughed with a 3/8″ ball nose bit and then routed using a 1/8″ ball nose bit with an 80% overlap.

I’ll be showing some pics when this gets to the router in a day or two and then off to the paint department. Stay tuned…
-dan

Published with permission from precisionboard.blogspot.com. Source.