Blocks for kids?

[Jeff Rowley]

I'd like to make my nephew a set of blocks, maybe something he could build a castle with, or something similar.

Has anyone seen (or have) a ready-to-cut design for a sheet of plywood, etc.? I will probably draw something up, but thought I'd see if there was already something similar out there.

[james mcgrew]

do you have a cnc? what type of file extension will it run?

jim

[Jeff Rowley]

I have a Shopbot, but even if someone had just a vector drawing, I could toolpath it.

[Jim Wilkerson]

I just purchased a book that has plans similar to what you may be hunting. It is called "Builder Boards". It has detailed plans to make interlocking boards to build kids playhouses. Google "Builder Boards" for more information and videos.

[Jeff Rowley]

Those builder boards are awesome! He might be a little young yet, but then again, the reason I wanted to do this in the first place is because he seems unusually good with lincoln logs, etc. for a kid his age.

Thanks for the link!

[Michael Kowalczyk]

Yes I agree. thanks for the post. I will see if I can get the book local or I will get it online. Too bad he doesn't have it in digital format :D with DXF or DWG files.

[james mcgrew]

you could make afile to cut from say a sheet of 1/2"

12-3x6
12-2x6
6-3x3
6-2x2
6-3x3x3 triangles
6-3" circles
6-2" circles

etc, and sand them well!

[Michael Kowalczyk]

Well No one had it in town and they said it was out of print but could be ordered. Amazon dot com had them but I would rather get it from Jack himself, so I ordered it from his website and should have it in a few days.

I am hoping that once I layout the standard pieces that I can either make them in Ecabinets and use a constraint manager on them so I can make larger units or I'll just draw them in Artcam Pro and manually stretch each part.

I am going to try it with 12mm birch ply and see how it looks and how sturdy it feels. I have some really cool bright colored water-based stains that I can mix up. I am going to see if I can run it on the C42 and how fast it can make it. In order to take advantage of the twin spindles, my limitation is the parts need to be less than 14.75" x 59.75", so it will work on a 5'x5' sheet. An even number of parts help also.

I may use a 1/8" round-over bit on one side to speed up the sanding process. This way I only have to run the parts on my shaper/router with the 1/8" round-over bit on one side. If it works really good then I can just get a 1/2" bull-nose bit. Who knows, I will just have to be patient and wait til the book arrives this week. They emailed me and said it shipped out today.

I watched a few of the videos on the website and it looked liked the roof was connected by Velcro. Any body else looking to make these? maybe we could co op on items like Velcro or what ever else we might need other than the ply. Just a premature thought since I haven't even read the book yet.

[Angus Hines]

HEre are a bunch of alphabet patterns here too.

http://www.abcteach.com/directory/basics/alphabet_letter_patterns/