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10. TEXTILE SCAFFOLD

RESEARCH & INSPIRATION

I really enjoyed this week. I love leather and being introduced to leather moulding and the CNC machine was very exciting. I have been interested in leather moulding for some time, I was first exposed to it trhough designers such as Boris Bidjan Saberi and his leather moulded sleeves and jacekts. Also through another of my favourite designers, Aitor Throup, who takes a more technical approach.

Boris Bidjan Saberi

Aitor Throup

LEATHER MOULDING

My aim with the leather moulding is to make a bag out of my logo design.

I will add a sketch here later.

I am using a lamb leather that is about 1 mm thick

MAKING MOULDS FOR LEATHER MOULDING ON CNC

LOGO_CNC_MOULD by Zander on Sketchfab

TOOLS FOR LEATHER MOULD

- CNC MACHINE
- RHINO & RHINO CAM
- LEATHER
- FOAM FOR MOULD
- POT FOR SOAKING AND HEATING LEATHER
- BAKING SODA / SODIUM BICARBONATE

PROCESS & WORKFLOW

from previous weeks i already had the logo files needed to make this mould. all i really needed to do was to do a boolean difference to put my logo shape into a box and also make a mirror/reverse version of it.

CNC MOULD

To translate a Rhino file to the CNC machine, you need to use a software extension called RHINO CAM.

It is a paid extension we did not have personal access to, so we used the school computers and a file from our instructor to configure all the settings.

here is an aproximation of the settings we used, as i was not able to recover the exact settings.

CNC Foam Cutting – Quick Settings (RhinoCAM)

Material: EPS/XPS Foam

Tool: Flat End Mill or Ball Nose (6–12mm typical)

  1. Roughing Pass (3 Axis)

Operation: Horizontal Roughing

Tool: 8mm Flat End Mill

Stepdown (Z): 5–15mm

Stepover (XY): 40–60% of tool diameter

Cut Feed: 1500–2500 mm/min

Plunge Feed: 800–1000 mm/min

Spindle Speed: 10,000–16,000 RPM

Clearance: Stock to Leave = 1–2mm
  1. Finishing Pass (3 Axis)

Operation: Parallel Finishing

Tool: 6mm Ball Nose

Stepover: 10–20% of tool diameter (e.g. 0.6–1.2mm)

Cut Feed: 1500–2500 mm/min

Spindle Speed: 12,000–18,000 RPM

Direction: Climb Cut

Stock to Leave: 0mm

  1. General Settings

    Tolerance: 0.01–0.05mm (higher tolerance = faster calc time)

    Cut Direction: Climb preferred (smoother finish in foam)

    Tabs: Not usually needed unless cutting full-depth profiles

    Holding: Foam can be held with double-sided tape or vacuum table

✅ Tips

Use dust extraction or hotwire pre-trimming for less mess.

Use high stepdowns and feeds—foam is forgiving.

Keep tools sharp to avoid tearing edges.

This is a simulation of the CNC process:

Video of CNC machine in action:

LEATHER MOULDING

  • To mould leather, you start by soaking your leather for 1-2 hours, depending on thickness.
  • heat water to NO more than 90°C and soak leather for 7 mins.
  • wring out leather and while still hot place in mould and stretch the leather.
  • clamp the mould together or use heavy weights to compress and hold the mould in place.
  • wait at least 24hr to 72hr for leather to conform to mould and dry.
  • take out of mould and let dry fully
  • depending on the stiffness of the leather you are after you can treat it with various mediums: beeswax, varnish, glue, or even bake the leather if its thick enough


I left my mould for 72hrs and this was the result. I then repeated the same process on a second piece of leather to have both sides of the bag.


CRYSTALIZATION

Petra told us that last year someone crystalized a cockroach. That same night, in my apartment, a cockroach happened to cross my floor. So i decided to crystalize him.

I used the COPPER SULFATE recipe, to try and crystalize the cockroach.

INSTRUCTIONS

  • boil water.
  • add a 1:1 ratio of water and copper sulfate (add copper until it will no longer dissolve and the water is over-saturated).
  • keep stiring the entire time until ready to pour into container / over what you want to crystalize.
  • place in a dark / hot enviroment for 24hrs.
  • you can repeat again to form more crystals or larger crystals on your existing ones.



PROBLEMS & POTENTIAL SOLUTIONS

Unfortunately, for a few reasons, the crystals did not take to the cockroach.

I belive it was due to a few different reasons.

  1. I used metal nuts to weigh the cockroach down to submerge him in the solution, and the copper was more attracted to the metal than the cockroach.
  2. I agitated the cockroach too much while it was soaking in the solution making it hard for the crystalization process to start
  3. I did not use enough Copper Sulfate in the intial batch.

I tried again, and once again it did not crystalize, but I did end up with many crystals in my container.

During the first batch, the metal nuts ended up forming red rusty crystals, and i reused the same solution to try again.

I believe that the leftover rust particles ended up forming the second batch of crystals.