Lesson Idea 6: Laser Cut Projects

Domenico_D

Happy Monday!

Here's another lesson idea from the PTC Academic group. What lessons or projects do you find most successful in your classrooms?

Laser Cut Ipad Holder 

Curriculum Idea: Design a product that fits on a desk to help organize or hold common items

Topic area: Product Design and laser cutting

Description: This project involves having the students research desk organizers, tablet/phone holders, and other desk/office accessories. They then sketch designs and decide on what they will make. Using custom features from other users makes it easy to take a design and get it ready to be laser cut. 

This would be easy to have students design at home. If school is teaching hybrid/in-person the projects could be laser cut at school and assembled

Learning Objectives: After completing this project, students should be able to:

1. Find custom features and Use them
2. Use the design process to make new projects
3. Export from Onshape

Models: Link to Model

Other resources:

Learn about using custom features: https://www.onshape.com/features/custom-features

@lemon1324 made some great featurescripts that you can use for this project: Featurescript for creating laser cut joints and auto layout of laser cut parts

@alnis_smidchens created a great video that shows one way to create laser cut-able designs: How to design a laser cut box

matthew_stacy

That's a neat idea @Domenico_D.  We all tend to advocate thinking outside the box, but there is great value in teaching designers to keep fabrication methods in mind from the earliest stages of the design cycle.

So much cost can be locked into a part by neglecting the limitations of available fabrication methods whether it be sheet metal, CNC machining, 2D laser/router cutting, or additive methods.