Brian Uretsky - Waffle Structures

Waffle Structure - Raindrop

I tried to create something in relation to my previous Star Trek theme. However, anything I designed would require hundreds of parts. I decided to do something different.

At the time I was thinking of a project, it was raining outside. I took that inspiration and decided to create something to represent nature and beauty.

The raindrop starterd as a simple curve that is then revolved around a full circle.

Below is what the shape looks like after the revolve.

Since the circle plane won't translate properly with the waffle structure, I needed to create a rectangular base.

I didi this by creating a rectangular curve and projecting it through the shape.

After performing the project command, I trimmed off the excess material and extruded the shape to form the base.

Using the Section command, I created contour lines across the model.

The screenshots immediately below demonstrate what the model would look like after laser-cutting the waffle parts and assembling them.

As you can see, the structure is incredibly complex with two hundred parts.

To make this simpler and easier to assemble, I chose to cut off more of my initial model and create something smaller.

I think the model looks a lot more solid and accurate.

The CutMyRibs script downloaded from the website is able to go through the project file and perform the section cuts needed to create the waffle structure.

After running the script, I still had a lot of work to do. I needed to fix all the improper section cuts so that the parts would fit into each other.

I used the Trim command as demonstrated below to get rid of the excess material.

This is what the laser cut boards look like. It is ready to be cut and then assembled.

Although fairly flimsey, the raindrop looks very cool in person. I plan to increase the slot count and re-cut the design and eventually mount it in a frame on my wall.