I have 15 puzzles to make for a school for autistic kids. The school is next door to a friends shop and we have meetings on the weekends there on occasion. I have made the .c2d files for 2 of the 3 types and have cut 2 of the 3 for a test.
This was cut on my SO3 XXL with HDZ. I put clear Watco Danish Oil on the base of the puzzle and Dark walnut on the pieces. It may need more coats. I will see in the morning.
I painted the top of the puzzle pieces silver and the bottoms black. These are 4-5 years old so I wanted to make them simple enough to put together but not so complicated they could not put them together.
I made a jig on my SO3 to drill them with a 1/4" brad point drill bit. I made a 3/4" hole but that was too big. Some of the birch balls are undersized.
I used 1/4" dowels glued on the birch ball and in the hole cut while cutting out the pieces. I left the dowels long and cut them off with a Japanese pull saw and sanded it flush with the bottom of each piece.
I had to cut 3-4 to align the jig to get the center. The jig hole was just undersized and I forced the ball down in to hold it to keep it from spinning while drilling. After drilling I would insert a dowel to get it out of the jig.
Each took at least 2h of work incl. sanding and finishing. Nobody will pay at least $120 for one of those.
And scroll saw is tricky. The saw blade is never exactly perpendicular, so like with the Triceratops it is by far not as precise as I would expect it from my work. So some of those have to be made repeatedly, a kind of reasonable production with a scroll saw must stay an illusion.
Now I tried to design some of those with the CNC. Critical is the distance between the pieces, it is of course not enough to define a offset, since that enlarges or reduces the whole piece proportionally. So is your design trial-and-error, or is there any kind of theory behind the design for the puzzles? A link would be highly appreciated, and of course your recommendation how to make those. Of course after Christmas, you are busy now with your Santa business.
Needless to say how I appreciate your work (although the whale might need some adjustment…)
Each puzzle I had to cut at least once to check fit. On the dog I must have offset twice and it was terrible.
I do scroll work myself but I find that the CNC cuts better than I can on a scrollsaw. I have a Hegner Scrollsaw that is great but the accuracy with the SO3 is so much better. I would say it is a wash as far as time because you have to find the images, convert to svg, separate each part and do the offsets and run the first one and adjust as necessary. However after the initial setup you can repeat with much better accuracy than I can do on a scrollsaw.
Here are two scrollsaws. The Dewalt was a friends and in rough shape. I cleaned it up and built a stand for it. The Delta I bought for my grand daughter. I have given a presentation about scrolling to my woodworking club.
My Cousin and her Husband had their dog pass. I found this in a book of scrollsaw projects. I cut it on my SO3. They have it sitting on their coffee table. It meant a lot to them.
Mathias, I always point people to this site for puzzle joints (and other interesting stuff.) Tailmaker has retired to the Vectric Forum, but is still active. It works for me.
