Bottle Opener in wood and aluminum
Project by
Michael Una
Published On
November 11, 2013
General Information
This simple bottle opener can be milled entirely on the Shapeoko. The deep luster of the wood and shiny finish of the aluminum balance each other nicely for a finished object that works well and looks good.
Note that the materials for this project allow you to make 10-15 of these bottle openers.
Project License
Attribution 3.0 Unported (CC BY 3.0)
Open in Easel®
I noticed in step 6 that the aluminum through holes are not very "circular". Is this from the MakerCam G-code or is this an issue with the precision of the machine?
Marc Schaefermeyer · November 14, 2013
Greetings- the holes are a little eccentric because I was running the feedrate too high on those and it was dragging the bit off-axis. If I were to run the job again I'd take those to half the speed for a tight perfect circle.
Michael Una · November 22, 2013
How thick the cut in aluminium could actually be? Have you tried with deeper cuts maybe? would be 1inch cut in aluminium too much to handle for shapeoko?
Matej Stefanac · December 11, 2013
I know it's a 600$ cnc and I don't expect it to run as a 15k one, but I am wondering where are the limits. I'm an industrial designer and my main use for shapeoko would be 1off pieces for prototyping.
Matej Stefanac · December 11, 2013
Using this technique, you could cut through 1" aluminum for sure. You just have to go slow and not step down too much per pass.
Michael Una · March 05, 2014
What are the dimensions?
Julian Stanton · December 12, 2014
The instructions for this project have disappeared. Are they still available?
John Shatney · July 16, 2015
Using basic Easel settings for aluminum it says it will take 9 hours to cut out. So.... that can't be right?
Theo Retos · June 23, 2016
Opening the Easel file, the simulation looks really thin at the sides of the aluminum opening compared to the photos. Like it would be fragile when opening a bottle... Should this really be cut using 1/8" bit with the "On Path" setting? Is the 1/32" upcut bit intended for the design on the walnut?
Fred Housel · September 05, 2018