Making hardwood cases on a CNC router

[skullydazed]

My local makerspace has a nice 4'x8' shopbot CNC machine, and I've been experimenting with making hardwood cases on it. So far I've been using 8" wide chunks of red oak:





Unfortunately none of those 3 worked off the machine and will take a lot of work by hand to clean up, but I'm continuing to refine my process.

I've published the g-code I'm using here:

https://github.com/skullydazed/Clueboard_CNC

[jacobolus]

Awesome!

I’ve been meaning to do a lot more of this kind of thing for about a year, but got really busy for a few months and then was sidetracked by multiple other projects.

One interesting thing you can do with Alps switches is make a thick combined top case/switchplate, and then you can even place the switches at different heights, to improve the “sculpting” of the board. See some of my early experiments at https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=60196.0

I haven’t put pictures up of a few more experiments I did after that, but I never made a full working keyboard out of wood.

One recommendation: if your router can handle it, try using a denser finer-grained wood. You’ll get cleaner cuts and can do somewhat more precise stuff. Exotic hardwood (bubinga, padauk, purpleheart, wenge, zebrawood, etc.) costs a lot more than oak, but compared to the time and work it takes to CNC a keyboard case, the materials aren’t too big a deal.

What maker space are you working out of? I was a TechShop member for a few months while doing this stuff last year.

[skullydazed]

Those experiments with tilting the switches are interesting. Not sure how I'd make a PCB for that (not a fan of hand wiring ) but I bet I can come up with something.

I'd love to do some other wood types, for now the oak is reasonably cheap since we have tons of it around here. Once I'm happier with the g-code I'll head up to global wood source to pick out some really nice exotic wood. They have some pretty nice slabs of wood. 

I'm working out of IdeaFabLabs in Santa Cruz. Not as big as techshop, but I rarely have to schedule time too.

[jacobolus]

Aha. I was hoping you’d say somewhere a bit closer. Santa Cruz is too far for me to go hang out with any regularity. :-)

[skullydazed]

Come hang out sometime anyway, even if just once! It's a friendly crowd there.

[harlw]

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