Airplant "Reef"

This was a fun little fusion of art and engineering that managed to utilize CNC machining, 3D printing, sculpture and painting all in one! It was a really nice change to use Fusion to create more organic free forms and splines, instead of the usual mechanical components.

Concept Sketch

Concept sketch for the final design - I do this for everything, as it's really helpful to get an idea down in 2D before jumping into CAD

I had planned on using ceramic animals available from Etsy or similar, but none of them were quite the right size or shape to fit well with the size "reef" I could make on the CNC machine, so I opted to design them from scratch for 3D printing! This gave me a lot more flexibility, and also allowed me to tweak the design if it didn't feel quite right (or the airplants didn't fit). I also wasn't quite sure how to actually mount the animals before designing them, so using Fusion allowed me to add the necessary features once I settled on using aluminum rods to attach the animals to the main coral. After 3D printing, I embellished each animal with some sculpting epoxy to give them more personality!

Squid CAD Design Process

This little guy was designed fully in CAD, then 3D printed in PLA.

Next up was the coral! This was a bit of a challenge, as I just don't use splines all that often and it took more time than I care to admit to get it just right. I also was running out of time - never commit to making Christmas gifts from scratch when you have grad school finals up until the week before Christmas. Fusion360 was used to generate the toolpaths for the CNC machine to follow using the CAD models; CNC was chosen for this instead of laser cutting (which would have been easier) because I wanted each piece to nest into the one behind it and CNC allowed for even filleting around the edges of the pieces.

CAD Render of Coral

Render of the model done in Fusion360, that will be CNC machined out of oak

CNC Toolpath Generation

CNC toolpath of one of the four pieces, which was generated in Fusion360. This was done for each piece, and exported as Gcode to ChiliPeppr run the machine. The simulation predicted a collision (where it flashes red), but the tool was far enough out that in actuality, this didn't happen.

Machining!

The most exciting part of any build is finally seeing something come to life.

Once all machining was done, everything was sanded and stained to emulate a "gradient", then sealed for protection. Assembly after this point went very smooth (thankfully), and the gift was a hit!