Owl and Bird tree stakes

[Peechy]

For all tho's looking for the eagle trace

Eagle tree stake trace.dxf

[jmersereau]

For all tho's looking for the eagle trace

Thanks. LOL, that's awesome!

-
Jim

[jmersereau]

Thanks David for the image!

Jim

[adbuch]

This should make it a little bit easier to auto-trace for those still trying to figure out how to do it on their own.
David

eagle tree stake black and white.jpg

[Searchman]

Thanks for sharing

[mywifestruck]

Cool Thanks

[shaferc63]

these are so fun looking thanks for the share

[jbailey]

Thank you Adbuch for the Owl & Bird tree stakes file. We cut several of them for craft shows last year and they were a big hit. Attached is a photo of how we displayed them. As you can see we also had cut out cardinals (which sold very well), a racoon, motorcyle (that I got from this forum), a woodpecker and some gnomes. We had a couple ask for some squirrel feeders that were on the same basis as the motorcycle so I took a couple of dxf files that I got off of Etsy and modified them.

Again thank you Adbuch for the files.

Tree Stakes.jpg

[adbuch]

That's a great display! Nice job. Happy we were able to help.
David

[plasmanewbie]

Fantastic display! Well done jbailey!!

[rusty gates]

I downloaded this file recent and I finally got to cut it today. It's 340mm high x 240mm wide.

Here's a photo of it cut out and also one of it stuck in a tree in our yard.

Thanks for the file, David.

regards
Rusty...

Owl in tree.jpg

Owl - 340x240mm.jpg

[adbuch]

Now that really looks great!! Thanks for showing us your finished product.
David

[rusty gates]

Now that really looks great!! Thanks for showing us your finished product.
David

The only thing I don't like is the very jagged edges of all the cuts....the owl doesn't have very many smooth lines. This makes the plasma table jump around a fair bit.

regards
Rusty...

[adbuch]

Now that really looks great!! Thanks for showing us your finished product.
David

The only thing I don't like is the very jagged edges of all the cuts....the owl doesn't have very many smooth lines. This makes the plasma table jump around a fair bit.

regards
Rusty...

What plasma table do you have, and what speed are you cutting? This is 14 ga?
David

[rusty gates]

Hi David

I built my own 4' x 4' table and it runs the MyPlasm CNC controller and plasma interface unit.

I cut this owl on 16g plate and my settings were 27A, 2200mm/min, cut height of 1.5mm and a pierce height of 3mm.

I've attached a photo of the nodes that make up the cut path around the owl's left eye (as you view the file) and as you can see, there's a lot of them. I can remove some and smooth out the various cut paths and see how that goes.
Maybe the design is such that it's supposed to have that wavy/jagged edge.

regards
Rusty...

[adbuch]

How did you produce this file? I don't think you need all those nodes to define the exact same path. I did an auto trace of your original image above using Inkscape and this is what I came up with.

owl 1.jpg

owl 2.jpg

I saved from Inkscape as dxf. You could take a look at this file to compare node count with yours.

owl from Inkscape.dxf

Then I opened the Inkscape dxf with Design Edge.

owl 3.jpg

I used the smooth tool to reduce node count.

owl 4.jpg

Here is the resulting dxf.

owl reduced node count.dxf

Now I joined/linked to eliminate unwanted intersections. Let me know if any of these helped with your jerky table motion.
It may just be that the your table is not rigid enough (mechanically) to accommodate higher cut speeds and you may need to either cut slower or modify your table. But I do think your final product looks good, and the jagged edges add to the character of the owl.
David

owl 5.jpg

owl smoothed and linked.dxf

[adbuch]

What plasma cutter are you using? Actually your 2200 mm/min equates to about 87 inches/min which is very slow for cutting 16 gauge. Here is the cut chart for Hypertherm 45xp (non-FineCut). You can see that the recommend cut speeds are much greater that your cut speed. But I suppose it depends on your table and specific cutter.
David

cut chart.jpg

[rusty gates]

Hi David
the owl file I cut was the one you posted at the beginning of this thread. When I opened the .dxf file in Inkscape, that's when I saw all those nodes, which I thought were excessive.
While I agree that the jagged edges to the cut paths add a degree of 'character' to the owl, I wasn't so much complaining about my table not being stable or capable of cutting them, but more the fact that it was responding to all the changes in direction, to follow all the nodes along all the cut paths.

I'm using a Jasic Razor Cut 45 plasma cutter (marketed in Australia under the Unimig banner) and I have the amps dialled down to 27 when I'm cutting 16 gauge, hence the 2200mm/min cutting speed...which works for me.

Can you please tell me where the 'smooth nodes' function is within Inkscape, thanks.

regards
Rusty...

[adbuch]

Rusty - I didn't realize that I had posted that file originally. Here is what to do with it.
First, open it with QCad and save from QCad in dxf R13 format.

Open with Qcad.jpg

Save from QCad as dxf r13.jpg

Then open the dxf R13 with Inkscape. I zoomed in to the eye as shown below.

Owl 1.jpg

"Path, Simplify" or Ctrl+L to simplify.

Owl 2.jpg

Owl 3.jpg

I hope this helps.
David

[rusty gates]

Hi David
Thankyou for the comprehensive explanation...it's greatly appreciated.

I'll give it a go myself and maybe cut another owl and check to see how it compares to the original.

regards
Rusty...

[adbuch]

My suggestion would be to use a sharpie pen holder mounted in place of your torch and draw your file on a piece of paper taped down to your metal, with your speed greatly reduced. This way you can watch the motion of the tip of the pen as it draws your shape following your cut path. Even with all the nodes in your original example, I would expect the curves to be smooth just like they appear in Inkscape. Try this out and let us know what your results are. Tom sells the 3D printed pen holders for around $35, but since you are overseas I think you could probably print your own. Perhaps he will share the stl file with you, or there are other designs as well. In fact, I have one that I have printed (public domain) that I could share with you as well.

David

[rusty gates]

I fabricated a pen holder and ran some drawing tests before I started cutting any steel, so if I can find it, I'll try what you suggested.

Rusty...

[Searchman]

Thanks for the share

[adbuch]

Thanks for the share

You are quite welcome! We are always happy to try to help.
David