Hello, thank you for joining me for your design and technology lesson.

My name is Mrs. Conway, and I will be guiding you through your learning today.

So today's lesson outcome is I can use CAD/CAM safely to manufacture designs.

So we're gonna be looking at CAD and CAM specifically, what that actually is, and how we can then use that to make our products.

These are today's keywords.

We have CAD, CAM, net, and lamination.

I'll go through each of those as we work through the lesson.

So first of all then, we're going to start by looking at computer-aided design.

Now, computer-aided design, or CAD, is software that's used to create detailed 2D and also 3D drawings of products and parts of products.

And CAD can be used with CAM to create physical outcomes and prototypes.

So what's CAM? CAM is computer-aided manufacturing.

And computer-aided manufacturing, or CAM, allows CAD drawings to be manufactured by machines.

So you basically draw it on the computer or the CAD and then the machine, the CAM, makes it or manufactures it.

The benefits of using CAM are that we can get much faster and more precise manufacturing, and hopefully that also reduces any wastage of materials as well.

Now one example of CAM is a laser cutter, and you may be familiar with this, you may have used it before, and you may have one in your classroom.

A laser cutter uses a high-powered laser beam to precisely cut or engrave materials like board, timber, metal, some polymers, and also fabric.

And this is an example of a laser cutter.

Now yours may look slightly different.

This will completely depend on the brand of the laser cutter.

A bit like a vacuum cleaner, there's lots of different brands, they all look different, but they all do the same job.

Let's just do a quick check for understanding on that.

What does CAD/CAM stand for? Is it A, computer-applied design and computer-applied machines, B, computer-aided design and computer-aided manufacture, or C, computer-applied design and computer-applied manufacture? Pause video here just to take a moment to think about that.

How did you get on? The answer was B.

So CAD/CAM stands for computer-aided design and computer-aided manufacture.

Well done if you got that right.

Now to use CAD to make prototypes on a laser cutter, designers first of all need to consider how to turn a 2D shape into a 3D form as laser cutters work in 2D.

Now there are different approaches a designer can take to do this, but two possible ways are nets and also lamination.

Let's just look at a net to begin with.

A net you may be familiar with, but let's just remind ourselves.

A net is the flattened out shape of an object, such as a box.

So here is an example of a cardboard box.

And once flattened out, it looks like this.

This is now the net of the box.

So we actually can see now by breaking that down how the box started as a 2D shape and then was folded and glued together to form a 3D shape.

Now a net would be drawn out on CAD software, usually 2D CAD software specifically, and then it would be cut out on the laser cutter as a 2D shape and then the net would be constructed using tabs.

You would also have scored lines on the card as well just to enable really easy folding.

If you have a little look at this example, you can see where I've labelled these different elements.

So the tab is on the edge there, and you can just about see that.

And there are lots of tabs on this, and the tab is where you apply glue to actually just attach it all together.

The scored lines that you can also see are the ones that are kind of going through the middle, and that will indicate where the fold of the box is going to go.

A scored line is like a line that goes partly through or indents into the card, but it doesn't go all the way through the card, and it just enables the card to be folded that little bit easier, especially if it's quite thick card like in this example.

Let's just do a quick check for understanding on that.

What are the parts of a net called that help with construction? Is it, A, tops, B, slots, or C, tabs? Feel free just to pause the video to take a moment to think about that.

And the answer, it was C, they're called tabs.

Well done if you got that right.

Right, if we go back to Laura then.

Laura decided that a net may not be the best possible solution for the making of her herb planter.

So just to remind you of Laura's design for her herb planter, you can see that on the right.

Now this is a kind of stepped kind of box that's going to sit all of her plants on it.

And she's decided the net won't be the best solution, but she needs to explain and justify that decision.

So she's written it here, "A net would be a great way to manufacture my product, saving on material, but I would be worried about its strength with heavy pot plants filled with soil placed upon it." Now a net is an example of a shell structure.

So actually the middle of the net is hollow, just like the box example.

And so Laura's right, if this is made out of card and the inside is hollow, it's not gonna be very strong, and so we are not going to necessarily be confident that it's gonna the weight of those herb plants.

So Laura has decided instead that lamination may be better.

Now lamination is the process of building objects by stacking and bonding multiple layers of material.

And Laura chose lamination as the process for constructing her herb planter, and she's done some testing on the laser cutter just to see if this is going to work.

So let's look at lamination in a bit more detail and what Laura's done to do this.

Firstly, Laura has drawn out the side panel or the side view of her planter in 2D using CAD software.

So this is similar to the image or the sketch that I just showed you, but this is the side profile view.

She's then decided to then cut multiple copies of that same shape out on the laser cutter before then glueing the layers together on the surface of each panel.

So here's the laser cutter cutting out multiple versions of that same panel.

These are all exactly the same.

It's a 2D shape and it's the side panel of her product.

And then what she's done is glued those all together.

And by glueing surface to surface, you can see she's kind of stacked up and laminated these different shapes together to create actually quite a solid object.

And these are much stronger shapes and objects than you think they're going to be.

Lamination results in a really strong and solid product.

And if you can see that example there, you can see it's actually quite tough and quite solid, so this is gonna be much stronger to hold her herb plants.

Lamination also has other benefits.

It also allows for creating more organic shapes, which could actually be quite difficult using a net.

So if this was actually a curved kind of shape, she could still laminate it quite easily, it would still be nice and strong, and it wouldn't be as complicated as trying to work that in a net format.

Right, time for you to have a go.

I'd like you to consider whether you could use a net or a lamination in your final product, and this will completely depend on the design of your product.

Then based upon that decision, I'd like you to then draw out a 2D CAD file for your final product that could be laser cut.

Now that could be the entire product or it could just be part of your product, that's completely and utterly up to you.

Now use your final design and also your orthographic drawings to help you with this as you'll need the measurements of your orthographic drawings to do so.

Right, you'll need to pause the video here, and good luck with the task.

Okay, how did you get on? Okay, hopefully you've got your CAD drawings all drawn out on whatever CAD software that you're using and they're ready to go.

So I asked you to draw out 2D CAD files for your final product or just part of your final product.

Now, if we just remind ourselves what Laura has done, she has drawn that 2D shape that she's drawn using 2D CAD software, and she's drawn the side panel because Laura decided to do lamination.

Now you will have done either lamination or a net or you might find a slightly different process, that's fine, but yours might be slightly different to Laura.

Laura has just explained here what she's done, "I drew a simple side profile of my product to use lamination as the process in the making of my product.

I took the measurements of my final product from my orthographic drawings." Remember, I did ask you to do that just to look at your orthographic drawings just to make sure that your measurements are correct.

And you might just wanna double check your measurements on your CAD drawing as well.

So now we're actually going to look at the laser cutter itself in a little bit more detail.

So how does a laser cutter actually work? A laser cutter works by directing a really powerful laser beam through mirrors or fibre optics to a lens, which then focuses the light onto the material.

Now depending on the machine settings, the laser cutter can either cut through the material or you can set it to engrave onto the surface of the material as well.

Here's example of the bed of the laser cutter.

Now remember, this could look slightly different to the laser cutter that you may have in school.

So you can see there you've got almost like a honeycomb kind of material or mesh at the bottom.

That is the bed of the laser cutter, and that is you made out of metal.

You then have the actual laser itself above the bed of the laser cutter, and that will be attached onto some form of arm.

And that arm will allow it to move in different directions and will be able to control where that laser cutter goes.

Let's just do a quick check for understanding on that laser cutter then.

What focuses the light onto the material in a laser cutter? Is it A, a mirror, B, a lens, or C, a prism? Feel free to pause the video here just to take a moment to think about your answer.

How did you get on? The answer was B.

It focuses the light through a lens.

Laura has decided to make her herb plant by laminating, if you remember, and she's doing that by laminating pieces of corrugated card and has decided to cut these out using a laser cutter.

Now she has her 2D CAD files drawn just like you have from your first task.

So she's now ready to use the CAM, the computer-aided manufacturing, which is the laser cutter.

Now Laura now needs to send her CAD files to the laser cutter, and she will need to do this on a computer that has the control software for the laser cutter installed.

Now in the control settings, Laura needs to now adjust the speed and the power so that they are correct for her choice of corrugated card.

The settings will need to alter depending on the material that you are choosing to make your product out of.

The speed is the speed that the laser actually travels over the surface of the material, whereas the power refers to the intensity of the laser.

And it's about getting the correct balance of those two things to cut your material effectively.

Now, as I said, settings need to change depending on the material that is being cut out.

Now in Laura's laser cutter, she has selected her material and thickness from a menu that's already there, and the laser cutter has now automatically calculated the speed and power.

Now your laser cutter might be slightly different.

Some do this automatically, as I said, using like a menu of different materials and thicknesses.

However, for other laser cutters, you will actually need to manually input the speed and power, but your laser cutters usually come with information of the kind of speed and power you should be aiming for depending on the material choice.

So do look at the manual or do ask your teacher for help on this.

You can see here in the example that this is the speed and power that the laser cutter has chosen for corrugated card for Laura's example.

Now laser cutters do vary, so some experimentation and testing may be needed just to achieve the correct settings for the material, but do ask your teacher for help.

You can also use different line colours, and on some machines you can actually use different lined thicknesses in your CAD files to actually control different speed and power settings.

What that enables you to do then is to tell the laser cutter which lines you want to actually cut and which ones are going to be engraved onto the surface of the material.

Now, once Laura has input her settings, she can send the file to the laser cutter ready to cut.

And Laura only wants to cut, she's not engraving anything at this point.

Let's just do a quick check for understanding on that then.

What can be used to create different settings depending on whether you want to cut or engrave? Is it, A, line colours, B, layer thickness or C, fill patterns? Feel free to pause the video here just to take a moment to think about your answer.

How did you get on? The answer was line colours.

I did also mention that some laser cutters actually work from choosing different line thicknesses, but line colours is the most popular one to use.

Well done if you got that right.

Now the first thing we need to do before Laura actually starts running her cut is actually ensure that the air compressor is on for the extraction unit.

And you can see here the example of the extraction unit for Laura.

Again, yours may look slightly different, but you'll see it's usually down the side somewhere near your laser cutter.

Now, extraction is really important.

It's needed when using laser cutters so as to remove smoke, fumes, and dust, and that keeps the air safe and it also prevents damage to the machine.

As well as that, it actually helps the cut to work better as well.

So it's really important that that is turned on before you go any further.

Let's just do a quick check for understanding on that as that's quite an important point.

What must be turned on prior to starting the job to ensure the air is kept safe to breathe? Is it, A, extraction, B, the air compressor, or C, the cooling fan? Pause the video here just to take a moment to think about that.

And the answer was the air compressor.

The air compressor makes sure that extraction is actually turned on.

Well done if you got that right.

Now next, Laura is going to lay her material onto the bed of the laser cutter.

Now card can sometimes move around on the bed of the laser cutter as it's quite lightweight and when that extraction comes on, it can have a little bit of movement in there.

This can affect the accuracy of the cut, which we don't want.

So here you can see Laura's actually used masking tape just along the edges of her corrugated card to help hold it in place.

You don't necessarily need to do this with thicker or heavy materials such as wood materials and also plastic or polymer materials.

It's usually only card and sometimes fabrics that need to be held in place like this.

Masking tape's the perfect choice as it's a permanent joining, it won't damage the bed of the laser cutter, and it also won't damage the card itself and can be peeled off quite easily, but will hold it in place.

So you can see, she's just laid it along the edge of the corrugated card and onto the bed of that honeycomb metal just a little bit there just to hold it in place.

Laura will then close the lid of the laser cutter, which you must do for safety.

Most laser cutters won't even start running until you've closed the lid anyway, but again, it needs to be closed for safety, and then she can start the job on the laser cutter.

Now the lid must remain shut and the extraction remain on throughout the job for safety and also to ensure that the cut runs properly.

And once the job is finished, that's when the lid can be opened and the pieces can be removed.

Right, it's time for you to have a go.

So using your 2D CAD file from Task A, you're now going to cut all or part of your product using the laser cutter.

Don't forget the steps that we've just gone through to ensure you get a really accurate cut, that you do it safely, and you're making sure that you've got the speed and the power settings correctly to get that cut correct.

Okay, pause the video here to have a go, and good luck.

Okay, how did you get on? Hopefully your cuts went really, really well.

Now don't forget, you might have had a couple of the parts that didn't quite work as you wanted, and that's why you used test pieces just to trial out those power settings.

But hopefully it's now correct, it's worked out exactly as you wanted.

Sometimes as you start to use the laser cutter, that's when you'll actually realise that your CAD file was incorrect, and that's when you would've had to have gone back and just alter your CAD file.

That's perfectly normal, that's part of the process, but it is always worth just double checking your CAD files before you move on to the laser cutter just to make sure.

So if you remember, Laura did this.

Laura's cut out multiple pieces of her side profile using her CAD/CAM so that I can laminate them to create my final product.

She's explained that there.

And that's her laminated cutout pieces of card cut out using the laser cutter.

Okay, let's summarise today's lesson then.

Today we were looking at equipment and machinery.

Now, CAD can be used with CAM to create physical outcomes and prototypes.

And one example of CAM is the laser cutter, which is what we've looked at today.

CAD can be used to make 3D prototypes on a laser cutter by making a net or with lamination as well.

And to remind ourselves, a net is the flattened out shape of an object such as a box.

Whereas lamination is the process of building objects by stacking and bonding multiple layers of material to get that really solid and strong product.

Our settings on a laser cutter when we come to use it do need to change depending on the material that is being cut out.

And the laser cutter may do that for you automatically or you may need to manually input those settings.

Okay, well done for the lesson today.

Hopefully you've had a chance to play with that laser cutter and get a physical outcome and you really have seen the progress that you've made through the lesson.

Thanks for joining me, and I will see you soon.