For this month’s Sample Club item, we got a bit ambitious, creating our own architectural model. Using 1/8” alder, we took an Italianate design and created a model house that you can build yourself.
Try building your own Suburbia! Play around with different ways to texture the siding and roofs and really make them stand out. You can also try different types of wood to see what looks best. This project might even lead you to build the model for your dream house!
Laser cut and etch stunning designs for architectural models.
Create a full 3D model of a house.
By adding laser etching to the process you can capture siding, brick work, and much more.
We used a 45-watt Helix with the following settings: 70% speed, 100% power for engraving and 30% speed, 100% power for cutting.
Open front.cdr and send it to the laser in combined mode. Repeat with identical settings for left, right, main_roof and roof2 files.
Next we need to create two jigs that will be used to engrave notches into the back of some of the model pieces. First, open jig1.cdr and send it to the laser in vector mode. When it is done cutting, remove the cut out pieces and replace them with Front A, Back A, Back B, and Front F.
Place the pieces in upside down so it will engrave the notches on the back of each piece. Now, send the file to the laser again in raster mode. We want these engravings to be deep in the wood without going all the way through the piece, so we used Raster settings of 30% speed and 100% power on our Helix 45 watt.
Repeat the above steps with identical settings for Jig 2.cdr. First cut out the pieces, then replace them with Front B, Front D, Left B, and Left C and engrave the slots. Time to build the model! First, find the following pieces: Front A, Front B, Front C, Front D, and Front E.
Take each of the pieces, and glue the slots together, using this picture as a guide.
Each piece has a slot that fits into the piece it attaches to, except for the right side of Front B. For that piece, place a dab of glue on the front of the bricks and glue it to the back of Front D.
After that section has dried, take pieces Front F, G, and H, Left B, and Right A, and glue them to the back of the first section you put together.
Next, find Left D and Left A and attach them to the house. After that, attach the garage to the house, gluing Back A and Back B to the back of the house.
Finally, there is one more piece to the body of the house to attach. Take Left C and attach it to Right A and Front H. It is easiest if you attach this piece last.
Next is the roof. We found that the best hinges to hold the roof together was scotch tape. Place the edges of the four pieces of the main roof together, and tape together each piece.
When the roof has been constructed, place dots of glue around the top of the house and place the roof on top of the glue. Two slits have been cut into one side of the roof to fit around the front tower of the house.
The garage roof is Roof B. Place dots of glue around the top of the garage door and place the roof over the glue.
Roof A and Roof C make up the left side roof. Use tape to hinge the two pieces together and glue it to the top of the porch.
Finally, use tape to hinge together Roof D, E, F, and G, and Roof H, I, and J. Glue them to the building, and you're done!