Cardboard Reindeer

This is about a side project. This was my original laser cutter project, but I decided to go with the more impressive project.

I Googled 'plywood reindeer plans' and I eventually found one that I liked.

Source:

The plans were far too big. I re-sized them to have an overall height of  ≈ 8.5 inches. I then had to go in and re-size the slots of the cardboard down to 1/8 or .125 inch wide. I also made two different sizes and one without antlers. I also modified the original plan to have a reindeer grazing and without antlers. I will go in depth about this project in a later post, so I will just skim over it now.

In order to cut them I needed to make the plans into a vector image. I did this by using Inkscape as I have mentioned in my previous articles. Here is the layout of the reindeer while still in Inkscape:

PDF file used for cut

Before I could even use the laser cutter I had to watch three videos and take a short test. The reason behind that is this: the laser is literally burning the material and cardboard is quite flammable. The laser cutter is potentially the most dangerous tool in the FabLab. There have been several instances of a project catching on fire while being cutout.

Once I completed the training for the laser cutter I could then use the cutter. The videos explains how to use the laser cutter, so I recommend you to watch the videos. Here are the reindeer still in the laser cutter right after it finished:

Still hot on the cutter

There are several different settings for the laser cutter. In this case the cutting parameters for the cut, such as speed and power, are listed on the front of our machine. It is a simple piece of paper listing different materials and thicknesses of said material. It then lists the power and speed settings to use. The settings were: 40% speed, 100% power, and 2500

I was able to get four reindeer out of a 20 X 10 inch piece of cardboard. I could have made the design more compact, but I thought that four reindeer was plenty. The slots are a tight press fit, but still come apart with some force. I wanted to be able to take them apart for storage, as I am 3 months too late for Christmas. I then assembled and arranged them:

A small herd of Reindeer

I thought that they turned out fairly well. Admittedly, they are more cute or neat than anything and not overly technical. There are a fun project that you could do with a child to get them interested in making stuff.

Here are the files for the reindeer:
PDF File
SVG File