So tedious setting up the tabs for all those parts. I think I spent well over 4 hours today just lining them up and arranging them onto the parts. Even after spending all that time, I found out the hard way, that I forgot to break the tabs off the cut lines. The laser cutter burned though the tabs anyway. I had to use masking tape to hold the parts in place so they didn't all fall out when I lifted them from the machine. Not a big deal with these first few parts, but I will have to fix that before I cut the rest of the ribs. Good enough for the first prototype.

Here's a short video of the new laser cutter burning through a sheet of 1/8" balsa:

Cutting 1/8" Balsa with a 40w CO2 Laser (4 min 15 sec)

Finished cutting all of the parts for the prototype bird. Other than the issue with the tabs, nothing stood out as being wrong. Will see how the REAL parts fit together now.

I was instructed that I have "chores" to get done before I do any building. So maybe I'll get started building the prototype tomorrow. Lately my "ToDo" list seems to be getting longer with less time allocated for building in it.

Thanks for posting the video. First time I've seen a laser in action. Very cool. Good luck with the build.

Fred

Well, let's see...a stove top is 30 inches and your pile of lumber looks to be about 18 inches, so can you find a cheap box to ship it in across the country ?

Yeah, I hope so. I want a box that's at least 24" so I can roll the plans into a cardboard tube rather than fold them. I hate it when I get a kit and the plans are all creased.

Anyway, I did find an outfit where I can get a somewhat low quantity of 24x6x4 boxes for shipping. Comes out to about $20 for 25 boxes. Per unit goes down with more bulk.


I'm still looking for a good source of 24" cardboard tubes. ULINE has decent prices on bulk boxes, but cardboard tubes cost as much or more than the boxes do and the minimum order is for 250 tubes. It's clear to me why so many laser kits are shipped with folded plans. I'd hate to break down and fold the plans.

Initially, I am planning on getting some printing/shipping help from Copy,Mail,and more in Arlington. I did talk to them, they said they do have tubes and boxes for shipping. Basically, for the first few kits anyway, I just prepackage up kit contents and take it to the Copy, Mail, and More in Arlington and they can do the printing of the plans and build booklet and any custom labeling. Cost isn't horrible for a few kits here and there.

I ordered a kit from Aerodrome RC and basically it was a box like you have above but everything had rubber bands. The plans were rolled but had a rubber band. The wood had a rubber band for different sizes of wood cut. It was fine. The only time I would expect a tube is if I ordered plans only. Even then, When I order just plans I am usually looking to re-size them and prefer them digitally anyways. Scanning large format is expensive!

If you do end up kitting it,... I'll take my kit,.. about April 1st,.. no box, plans folded. It don't matter to me.
Here's a thought, USPS used to offer Priority Mail triangular boxes, 25x6x6x6, I have no idea of costs, but everything might just fit inside. It'd be great if the boxes were free like other Priority Mail boxes.

Fred

I picked up a bunch of long narrow plastic bags from our local hobby shop. I think they will work in conjunction with a rubber band for the plans. I can use packaging plastic around the wood bundles too. Doesn't look like the shipping boxes will be an issue. I'll also take a look at what USPS has to offer as boxes for shipping. Free is a good price.

I should be able to get the prototype bird built, tested, design tweaked, and a 2nd kit cut by April. I just picked up some of what Janice (local hobby shop) had left. Was slim pickings, heavy, but will work for the prototype. I'm hoping to order a bunch of contest balsa from National Balsa for future kits, but I have to wait for a bit for funds to collect. My income seems to be lagging behind my outgo here lately.

Materials needed for a short kit:
3 - 1/8"x4"x36" balsa sheet
5 - 1/16"x4"x36" balsa sheet
4 - 3/32"x4"x36" balsa sheet
1 - 1/4"x1/4"x36" square balsa stock
1 - 1/16"x6"x12" air ply sheet
1 - 1/8"x3"x36" lite ply or stiff C grain balsa (two 18" lengths)

Electronics:
1 - 28mm Outrunner with a standard X mount (eg: 2826 with an APC 9x4.5e, 2830 with an APC 9x5e, or 2836 with an APC 9x6e prop)
1 - An appropriate 3s LiPo (1300, 1800, or 2200mah)
1 - An appropriate bushless ESC (18-25 amps)
1 - receiver
4 - mini servos (HXT900 or similar)

Will need other materials like: Wheels, 3/32" music wire to bend landing gear from, Landing Gear Straps, pushrods, and linkages, etc... I'll generate a list as I build the prototype over this coming week.

I cut the balsa sheets in half to make 18" planks so they fit in the laser cutter. Each plank takes on average about 3 minutes to cut. Some planks take as long as 6 minutes while others take only 30-45 seconds.

Fred, when you get home and get a chance, take a look at what stock you have. I'll see what I have in my shop too. Would be a good thing to use contest grade balsa sheet so feel free to order some from National Balsa. Give me a call.

I was refitting the fuselage parts in 3d with the scanned texture maps and I found a small issue. It is possible to build the battery hatch wrong. Some of the parts are keyed to go together in more way than one. I've already got those parts cut for the prototype, but I will have to fix them for the plans and before cutting the next kit.

Tailfeathers tomorrow and then, hopefully, I can start building the prototype.

Now I have all the parts textured and ready for illustration. Just have to lay out the plans and start building.

Here are a few more finalized renders of the 3d model. I should be able to render all of the parts orthographically as a kind of a watermark on the plans.

Originally Posted by Willsonman

Brilliant! Do show the steps to do this!

Over the next few days, I will be working on the plans. I will do my best to document how I render the 3DS image onto the plans. Will see how it goes.

sweet

It is a considerable amount of work and quite tedious to build and texture the 3d model to render in exact scale to 2d plans. Through a bit of trial and error, I finally got the results I was looking for.

I'm not going to give an absolute step-by-step on how to render plans from 3ds max. If you don't use 3ds max then you can skip the rest of this post.

Rendering Plans (greatly simplified):

1. Lay out the parts in 2d as they would be on the plans.
2. Decide how many pixels per inch or DPI you will use. I use 150 dpi for printing. My plans will be 48"x24" so I will need to render to a 7200x3600 pixel bitmap.
3. Print your parts (in vector format) from your 2d cad software to a PNG (7200x3600) so you can import it into a layer in Photoshop (or GIMP).
4. In 3ds max, texture a 48"x24" plane with the vector drawing of your plans and orient your 3d model so it sits exactly over the drawings of the plans.
5. Create an Ortho Target Camera with the target centered on the plans pane and the camera centered directly above.
6. Set the render resolution to your output size (7200x3600). Now the camera should have to proper aspect ratio.
7. I like to set the environment background to true green so it stands out. Change the Lens on the Camera until you just start to get a green border around your render. Save that render and import it into a layer in Photoshop
8. In Photoshop you can crop that rendered image to just get rid of the "green" border. Resize the image back to the output size (7200x3600).
9. Use the magic wand tool and delete the background coloor from the vector map in Photoshop.
10. If you've done everything right, you should have a render that's perfectly lined up with your cad drawing.
11. Now just finish the plans by editing in Photoshop.

Any particular distance you recommend fro your Ortho target camera to be from the plan surface?

What I did was set the lens of the camera to 16.5mm and then dragged the camera back until the green border just started to appear around the plans pane in the render window. I does help to lower the render resolution while tweaking the camera so you don't have to sit and wait so long between tests. Get the camera positioned then bump the resolution back to high for the final output.

Another note. I changed the texture of the "plans pane" back to solid white after the 3d parts are positioned for the final output. It was easier to just import and use the original vector drawing to get a lines layer in Photoshop.