Tuesday, January 5, 2010

Innovative use of CNC ‘digital joints'


 
Panels 02 & 03 by Paris based sebastien wierinck will be shown at salone Satellite with the 101pct Designed in Brussels selection. The interesting thing about this work that sets it apart from much of the flat pack furniture in the field is the use of CNC specific construction joints, rather than emulating standard joinery or basic slots.
As CNC cabinetry becomes more accessible we will see some otherwise impossible (or at least really really difficult) digital wood joints being shared on the web.

Flexible Stream, is sharing 50 digital wood joints including the actual files needed, along with a PDF of instructions, and examples of use, all under a Creative Commons, Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported licence.



The digital wood joints were developed in the course of several years of reserch at the C…Lab of the Hochschule für Gestaltung Offenbach, a project headed by Prof. Jochen Gros and Designer Friedrich Sulzer. The result of this research are 50 digital wood joints, devided into frame joints, board joints and carcass joints. These wood joints are meant to inspire you, so that you will experiment and use them for your projects or develop your own digital woodjoints. They provide each wood joint in various data formats. Download the complete package (49MB) and you get them all including a PDF-Guide and suggestions for use. Or download only 4 examples and seperatly the instructions for these examples.
Present a joint concept like this to your local cabinetmaker and they will either ask why, curse you or both.. Prof. Jochen Gros and co. are also keen to see your modifications and pictures of implementation.

Flexible Stream is a source for free Design. Professional designers (including Ronen Kadushin) are offering samples of their skills for your convenience. It is totally free! Please download the construction files without any charge to build or let built this product. Many production methods can be applied: Rapid manufacturing (Rapid Prototyping, 3D-Print), CNC supported Milling, laser cutting, water jet cutting. Some product though can be done just with a pair of scissors made from paper or made with a jigsaw using wood.

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