During the Molding and Casting week at the Fab Academy program, I decided to create a two-part mold of a piglet. Feel free to download the files at the bottom of the page!
Design Process
I started my design in SOLIDWORKS, I used extrude boss/cut on features such as the ears, eyes, and nose. To make my piglet looked more like a piglet, I chose to use the style spline when creating the sketch of the ears and the face. I then used the revolve feature to create the 2.5D look of my piglet's head. Here is how my design look:
Once I was happy with my design, I was ready to make the model for the wax block for milling. I planned to use the Roland SRM-20 milling machine at the 3DEXPERIENCE Lab for my design and I found that using the 1/8" Flat End (4 Flute) milling bits would work for this assignment. I double-checked the parameters on the design and realized that the 1/8" bit would not be able to travel through the eyes and the nose as it was narrower than 1/8", so I made some small adjustments to ensure the design would work for the tool.
I used the split tool in SOLIDWORKS to split the object in half vertically and added three registers (the ball connectors) so that the molds could fit together firmly later. I also added a "funnel" shaped spruce to pull the casting material and let the air out. Here is how the waxing block looked. I saved the STL model of the wax block to set the tool paths in the CAM software (MODELA Player 4) of the Roland machine.
I also wanted to see what the mold would look like, so I used another subtract function in SOLIDWORKS to realize the shape. I really liked how the digital twins helped me visualize the positive and negative mold design.
Fabrication Process
The machinable wax was milled using a roughing process followed by a finishing process. The roughing process is when the milling bit travels in x-y directions, and the finishing process is when the bit travels in the z-direction.
Here is a short video of the roughing process done in the Roland machine.
Here is the result of my piglet from the roughing process:
Here is a short video of the finishing process.
Here is the result of my piglet from the finishing process. The milling process took 5 hours in total, but all the efforts got paid off! I was very happy with the surface finish!
Files
Find below the files that I made for this assignment. Please do not hesitate to download and use them! I hope you enjoy them!!
- Model: Pig. STL file
- Positive Mold: Modeling wax .STL file (This is the mold to make the Negative Mold; In my assignment, I used this file for milling, but it can be 3D printed too!)
- Negative Mold: Mold .STL File (This is the mould to make the final cast piece)
