Prototyping week. We product designers fantasize about how easy and friendly we make our products for our manufacturers, specially when we have some degree of understanding of the machines used in the process. Reality hits hard most of the times.

Your CNC worksheet may be a single sheet of paper, but it is the result of A LOT of work. It details the paths your CNC will follow, feeds and speeds, and tools and bits to use. Here are a few of the tools we used.

We call this little tool "the beast".

And here are some of the first results. It is fundamental to adapt paths, fillets and curves to the existing tools available at your shop. How will you know that? Well, simple inventory. Or buy'em as you need'em. Always test toolpaths with scrap material.

Dan's quick reflexes prevented further damage to the part and the router bit. Holes were bored in a one single step and this can't be good. You need chips and you need to take all that heat out! Next approach: Bore holes in a few steps, or ideally, use standard drill bits.

This next week we will be refining details on the models based on all the feedback gathered from the first models. And after that, it will be time to have working prototypes ready for the wood products.