Project 5: Press Fit
By: Zach Fuller
Info
We were given the project to create something using press fit. I googled press fit to try and get some ideas for what I could make. I found a cool looking airplane that was made out of something similar to press fit and that's where I got the idea. I then used Autodesk Inventor to create my airplane. My teacher showed me the "Loft tool" which is what I primarily used to contruct it. After finishing my design I sent it to a program called 123D Make, then I decided how big my card board is going to be and why type of cut I was going to use. After getting the plans I send it to illustrator to be properly formatted and set the cut line to the right red. Then I went to the Laser engraver with a program called UCP and we then cut out my three pieces of cardboard. After punching out all of my pieces, I cut a dowel to the right size and just began glueing my pieces together. The end price of my design was $1.80.
Possible Customers?
I really wasn't planning on making is to sell to anybody. If I did make this to sell to people the target audience would be children wanting a cool toy to play with. Another thing I could sell this for sort of decoration just to sit up somewhere in the house. It would be desirable just becuase it's really neat thing to mess around with.
Auto Desk Inventor
This is where I made the original design in auto desk using the loft tool.
123D Make
This is where I entered the type of material I'll be cutting with and also the way I want my airplane to be cut.
Final Product
This is how my final product turned out after I cut it out and glued it together.
Struggles/Review
The first struggle was trying to build the main cylinder of the airplane. I first tried using the free form tool but that was not working so then I just made made a cylinder and tried reading the edges. It still did not look the greatest so my teacher showed me how to use the loft tool. After finishing that I carried on with the process and did not come to another problem until I got to laser engraving. After cutting out the pieces I realized that I made my wings way to small and the began to fray on the end of the wings. This just made my final look a little wrong, so next time I would probably either choose a better material or just make the wings better in Inventor.
I was pretty proud of the end result because it took me quiet awhile to put together and after I was done I thought it looked really cool. It was fun piecing together the airplane and I also learned how to make things on Free form and I could make a cool design with hat in the future. I learned how to use the Auto desk program and how a dowel can help me line up my press fit.
Press Fit Airplane