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Connect Four with a laser engraver

Next thing to try with a laser engraver is to make box. No need for sophisticated patterns. Just rectangles with adjusted height do the job.

Table of Content

(Draft)

Cutting the Pieces

Params	Value
Model	Sculpfun S30 10W
Mode	Cut
Plywood	3mm
Cut Speed	4mm/sec
Power	100%
Air Pump	Yes

Params	Value
Model	Sculpfun S30 10W
Mode	Engraving
Plywood	3mm
Cut Speed	200mm/sec
Power	100%
Air Pump	No

Designing and cutting the pieces takes some time.

Try the assembly without gluing.

To avoid getting dark borders, I will use some marquetery sheet to cover the plywood.

I just need to cut it as the plywood, without changes.

This wood is very thing and must be manipulated carefully

Mounting the box to see if everything OK.

We need to glue the thin sheets to the plywood. Afterwards, it would have been better to glue the structure and after the covering sheets: because of the glue, the pieces couldn’t match correctly as before.

The thin wood is a full rectangle.

You can see the before / after varnish color.

I use a few books to be sure that everything is glued together.

Now, the coins. I used two plywood, one a little bit darker than the other, and draw a specific pattern on.

I got one unresolved issue with the laser. As the laser heat after starting, it seems that it reaches its max temperature. However, this burn the wood. As an example, here are 5 coins cut on the same plywood during the same pass. The first are not burned while the last are quite dark.