Repeatability

For this assignment we need to make five of something — my first idea was to make an eyeglasses holder. I’ve seen some on the internet in the past, but wanted to make something that had a more simple design and a smaller package. Here are some examples of other ones:

I personally wouldn’t own one of these that are shaped like animals or a face, so again my goal is to make something simple/minimal and a bit smaller than these.

Here is a rough sketch of how I might want it to look like. There is also another sketch of a second idea I had which was to recreate one of the first things I built in P Comp. In the first lab we had to make a creative switch, so I fabricated a stand for a record sleeve that would light up the album when it was placed in the holder – pictured on the right.

The plan is to make these five objects out of wood so I took a field trip over to Home Depot.

I picked up a five pack of 2″x4″x2′ pieces of lumber. Which was protected from the rain by a trusty Ikea bag.

I also ordered my own Dremel – I figured if I was going to order an attachment kit I might as well just get the whole thing.

I have found it a bit challenging as I tried to think of the most efficient way to cut my 2×4’s, while making sure I don’t create pieces that are too small where I won’t be able to use the band saw.

As of right now, I think the best way to cut into these 2×4’s is to break my object into two parts and glue them together.

I also used my AirPods case as a reference to what width my eyeglasses could sit on nicely. Below is also a photo of some more sketches that show some dimensions as well as the start of my plan to make a jig.

Below is a plot with dimensions as well as a 3D mockup from when I was messing around with CAD, and the start of planning my cuts.

In my first attempts, I worked on the method that would involve glueing together two pieces. In the images below, I cut the piece so that the bottom and top were separated, and I also cut out a jig to use so that I could cut the top corners of the bottom piece off at the right angle. Eventually, I realized the jig would have been better if I made it longer, but I managed.

Next, I trimmed down the two halves and removed the unwanted material. However, I discovered that the corner pieces of the bottom half were difficult and too small to remove using the band saw, so instead I was able to sand it down. While doing this, I took a slight turn away from my plan and took a piece of wood that was 1.5″ x 3.5″ x 2.5″ and cut it down to the shape of my object, so that it was one solid piece.

After going through the whole process and making enough segments for eight pieces, and also presetting them with rubber bands, I could not get it flush enough so that it would glue nicely, and I also did not like the look of the two separate parts.

So after some more consideration, I decided to veer away from this method and carve out each object from a solid piece because I figured I could get them to look more uniform. I kept the banded pieces just in case.

I think it actually went better this way. I started to sand down the pieces and round the corners a bit, I’ll continue to tidy them up, round some more edges, and make them as identical looking as possible.

I’m also thinking of making some kind of notch at the top to add a little extra support to the eyeglasses sitting in place.

Here is the (mostly) finished product, I added a shallow notch at the top and smoothed out the surface and corners.

After making these pieces, I wished I had done something else. I felt like this was too simple. Not that simple is bad, I love simple, but I wanted to do something a little bit more complex or with more than one part.

I quickly tried to come up with another plan to try and finish by class — if I couldn’t get it done in time at least I will still have the eyeglass holders which meet the requirement. Anyways, I thought back to my second idea to recreate the record sleeve holder from last semester, and from that I thought of a cookbook holder or just a book holder in general — and something that can hold my iPad while I’m cooking. I was looking at some examples online and liked the ones that incorporate wood and also some metal. I started to think of ways I could build something like this, and I added in a component that would make the whole stand collapsible.

Here are some starting sketches, as well as some more thought out sketches with dimensions, and some planning on how I’m going to approach cutting the pieces as well as assembling them.

We’ll see if I can get this done in time.

After figuring out how much material I would need, I went back to home depot to get two sheets of 3/4″ plywood that are 2′ x 2′, some 1/4″ wood dowels, as well as 1/8″ round aluminum rods. Unfortunately, I chose the location that does not cut wood for you! I was planning to get the plywood sheets cut in half so that I could more easily hop on the train back to school, but somehow I still managed to drag these whole sheets of wood back to Jay St. Once again thanks to the trusty Ikea bag.

Once back at the shop, I worked on cutting down the sheets into the sizes I needed. Leia at the shop showed me how to use the panel saw in the basement so that I could use the band saw with smaller sections of wood. At first, I sketched out all the dimensions of every piece I needed and started to cut them using the band saw. But then I thought, there must be an easier way, even though the segments I needed were on the smaller side. I ended up using the miter saw and making a block for each different width of wood I needed.

After finishing all of my cuts, I had to head home and do the rest there so that I could also do other work and school work. I worked on assembling a trial, and I’ll be honest there was a lot of eyeballing when I was drilling the holes for the dowels. So obviously, there were slight misalignments and uneven surfaces.

Here are some photos of the my test version:

I ended up adding a slight lift at the back and turning the front 90 degrees to compensate for some unevenness. It turned out pretty wonky and is pretty much just a glorified iPad stand. Tragic.

I decided to move forward and assemble the actual five. I did some measurements and had a general measurement for all my drill holes for the dowels.

Here are some photos:

Let’s just call this a first iteration. We’ll see how they turn out and it they can even hold anything up. At least I have my little eyeglass holders/stands.

Well they definitely turned out better than my wonky test version. I went back to the original drawing, the only things that are missing are the support beam — I just glued the vertical panel in place and sat it flush against the back part of the base. The metal bar at the front that is meant to hold the book open is also missing — mainly due to time and I didn’t get the 1/8″ metal rod I wanted.

And lo and behold, it does hold a cookbook!!! The pages kinda fly about but that’s because I’m missing that front rod. Unfortunately, each piece isn’t quite identical, there are places I would need to sand down, and not all of the bases sit completely flat against a horizontal surface. But wow who would of thought things turn out better when you make measurements.