Had my son at work with me today, and spent some time getting new ventilation set up for the laser cutter. I decided to test the ventilation and keep him engaged by making something for him. He had brought along a giant yellow lego brick container, so I made some dividers.
Ideally, these would be in clear acrylic. Nice and thin, and clear to help find pieces easier. Contoured to the bottom of the container would also be a nice touch so nothing can slide under.
However, I wasn’t confident in the ventilation system having enough pull to contain the smell of acrylic, which would have driven the kid out of my office. And I didn’t have much time left in the day. So I did a quick and dirty.
Many mistakes were made, but lessons learned are useful, and we got a final product.
So, we start with the current sorting solution, bowls out of the kitchen:
I slap together the absolute simplest possible file (just rectangles) for the divider:
Now, I measured poorly for this, picking the measure off the top of the container instead of the bottom for the width. It flares out a considerable amount it would seem. So for the next time, I need an arc, instead of straight lines. For this time, I had to re-cut (which I needed to do anyway, since there were some mid-layer knot issues anyway). I knew things hadn’t worked out right, so I left the main cut of wood in place, so I was able to put things back and adjust easily (yet another, GlowForge doesn’t need to worry about this thing).
Final result is serviceable:
A very simple project, but the idea with this post isn’t to awe and amaze. We have TONS of that. The idea here is to remind people how very easy this can be, and useful in many random ways and places. Do not worry about getting every detail flawless, if quick and dirty can work, no reason not to let it.
