Hexconic
Manufactured Assembly
CAD: Solidwoks
Design
Design
CAD: Solidwoks
CNC Milling
Fabrication
Fabrication
CnC Milling
Design
Fabrication
Sketches to CAD
Engineering at its Finest
At the end of my Senior year of High School I wanted to make the most out of my time in my manufacturing class. I wanted to make a project that required the machining of a more complicated part. I decided to make an object with identical parts that expands into a circle and contracts into a hexagon. I spent a solid couple hours just fiddling with how this could be possible in the first place. Although the circle is not completely full, it does a good job doing what I wanted it to do. Along with the task of changing shapes, I also had to consider a design that would be manufacturable.
3 Axis Milling
Set up
The program at my high school was completely renovated and had brand new equipment. Pictured in the surrounding images is the inside of a Hass machine. To make my product I had to add a “fixture plate” to the bed of the machines table. To do this I bolted the plate down, and set a G55 work offset which is the hole on the top left. This plate is the giant piece of aluminum pictured in the surrounding photos.
5 Operations
Nuts and Bolts
I personally and independently programmed the CAD for all 5 operations. Complete with facing, pocket, dynamic, and contour tool paths, it did it all. In order to create the desired geometry, I had to perform two operations on each side. To do this I bolted my stock to the fixture plate, ran the program, rebolted, and ran another program. The placements of the bolts were critically positioned to prevent the mill from running into them. Bolting the part down to the plate made flipping the part seamless because the bolts positioned the part in a numerical location I had calculated.
