Digital Fabrication: The SBench

[Laser cutting] Students: Andreana Papantoniou, Antigoni Anna Anastasopoulou

Concept

The main idea was a bench that can be used from both sides in order to be more functional. Our intention was to create a form that will follow the concept of the linear shape of the whole system of the benches, in a smaller scale. To reach the desirable result we needed to work both in top and perspective view.

Design Process

We first worked on the given surface using the control points and we experimented with different possible forms. After deciding the final form of the exterior surface we started the process to prepare the file for the laser cutter. The basic commands that we used were the Contour command to create sections in every 50mm and the intersect Command to find the intersection line between vertical and horizontal planes. We created then cylinders of 3 mm diameter (the material’s thickness) and we used the BooleanSplit Command between the horizontal and vertical surfaces and their corresponding cylinders. We put the curves of the final pieces on the board using the Rotate and ProjectToCplane Commands. An interesting point of the designing process was that we had to divide some surfaces in two pieces in order to make feasible their connection with the corresponding verticals in the assembly process.

Fabrication

All the pieces of the bench were placed in a 2.50 m. - 1.20 m. dimensioned board for the big laser cutter of Iaac’s Fablab and both fabrication and assembly process were completed successfully without any special problems.