Comment by cweagans
3 years ago
Huh. Alright then. Either way, I'd recommend leaning toward a less textured, richer/darker color and species of wood. If you go lighter, it's going to look a little washed out IMO.
Also, in your quality control for the wood bits, make sure that those mitered corners all line up evenly across the entire joint (examples of what I'm talking about highlighted here: https://monosnap.com/file/MkTzAjJhx7v7DkL5kOKypQNFKVyrNU). People who have purchased any kind of fine woodworking will see this and see something somewhat poorly made, even if the actual electronic hardware and software parts of the product are rock solid. The presence of those gaps means that one or more of the following things are true: 1) the miters weren't cut at a perfect 45, 2) the wood wasn't dried long enough, 3) the pieces were cut too short, 4) the wood was moved from a high humidity environment to a low humidity one (causing it to dry out and shrink slightly). 1 and 3 can be solved by closer inspection/better processes for the people/machines cutting the wood. 2 and 4 are harder to remedy if it's possible at all. I'd guess it would mean a new supplier + factory doing the wood bits.
Not necessarily saying that layout options would be _necessary_. Just pointing out that something more focused on showing immediately relevant information (i.e. scoped to _today_, rather than this entire week) might help to more clearly define the value of the product to a prospective buyer.
Personally I prefer the subtlety of using lighter woods (maple would be my preference).
A darker wood enhances the contrast with the white e-paper, but is over-the-top (IMHO).
I guess I see a lot of people new to woodworking do the maple+walnut thing to make a bold statement but I don't feel it stands up over time ... if that makes sense.
Thank for the tips on the woodwork. I am not sure if a darker color would make the screen look brighter or darker.
I had noticed those gaps in the frame as well. I agree they look poorly made :)
I think they are mostly from the fact that this was cut with a hand saw, and the cut wasn't even throughout the Z axis. I am hoping that I will be able to fix this as I go from a prototyping process to a more refined production process.
Another commentator brought up CNC milling the wood - what do you think of that idea?
Not the original commenter, but
> CNC milling the wood
It’s a frame. It’s not a complex shape. A simple mitre saw should be enough to do this consistently. Don’t make this more complicated than it needs to be.
Guillotine cutters are also useful for making frames: https://www.rockler.com/miter-trimmer
Picture frames are a solved problem. Metal, wood, whatever. Build your item to known demension and let people order exactly what they want
CNC sounds like kind of a bad fit unless you're going to mill the entire frame out of a solid piece of wood -- you'd lose a lot of material to the router bit and still have to do a fair amount of finishing by hand. For mitered joints like this, there are computerized saws that can feed and cut the lumber pretty precisely, but those are very expensive.
I'm not super clear on whether or not you're doing all of this by hand or working through a factory. If it's the latter, I would recommend just setting your expectations for the final product very clearly and then make sure that the end product is meeting those expectations. If you're doing it by hand, practice makes perfect! Go to your local lumber yard store and get some construction grade pine or fir boards and cut several dozen miters by hand (you can also invest in a compound miter saw -- that's generally useful for any woodworking that you'd want to do down the road as well and you can find them used for ~dozens of dollars or brand new for ~100-500 depending on features, size, power, etc -- just make sure you've got a good, sharp blade with lots of teeth for a nice smooth cut). You'll get the hang of it. For soft woods, clamping pressure and even glue distribution matters too -- you can clamp them a little tighter and the wood fibers at the boundaries between the boards will crush down a bit and help to even out the joint. That doesn't work so well with hardwoods though - you'll have to be pretty precise to get those done right.
Depending on the thickness of your wood, you might be able to do something with a laser cutter, but you'll need to figure out how to square up the edges appropriately (since laser cut edges on thicker lumber are rarely perfectly square).
If you're particularly lucky, you might be able to find somewhere that will give you some time on a water jet. Those edges will be perfectly square and everything will be cut perfectly -- just make sure to thoroughly dry your parts before assembly.
Hey, thank you for that comment. Those are really good tips regarding the woodworking. I'll look into one of these miter saws.
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If you want the bezels look less chunky, have them taper inwards towards the screen. It'll give the allusion of thinness and also pull the screen forward visually.
Re CNCing the wood: I'm not a woodworker, but given the simplicity of the cut, I'd dare say that miter sawing the planks using a guide would more than suffice.
I'm both an amateur woodworker and a professional CNC programmer, and this is right. Frames like this are made with routers to carve the profile, and miter saws to cut the corners.
Personally I'd love to buy the guts and make my own frame, to personalize the gift with a nicer frame than I'd want to pay someone else to make.
Give me a good dimensioned drawing or a 3D model (or both!) of the display panel and the electronics that drive it, I'll chop some scrap into a mockup of the screen, craft a custom frame around it, and then swap in the real guts when I'm done.
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To me the value is in seeing the entire week. I already have my outlook notifications for things happening on the current day.