Design question - flat design onto conical cue

pongohops

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
Been playing around with designs and designing it in Adobe Illustrator if any of your are familiar with that - a graphics program that is 2D. I am not a cuemaker, but rather trying my hand at having my own design made.

What I am doing is using the diameter at key points of the cue... butt, above the wrap, and joint... and using that to get the circumference value to use as my 'available' width in the flat design. So, lets say the joint is .850", I would have .850 x π = 2.67" available width.

The problem I am facing is kind of two fold. I can print my flat design on a piece of paper, cut it out, and it will wrap around the cue pretty much spot on to what I expect, BUT if you use those dimensions in the CNC program the design the inlays are going to end up larger than what is expected... it is cutting the design flat onto a curved surface. Hopefully that makes sense as I don't know how else to describe it.

So, is there a formula or something that will allow me to calculate the correct height width of these inlay designs so when cut they will end up what I expect? The only other thing I can think of is if I can digitally turn my 2D design into a 3D one and print the design off at 'zero' for each inlay, then measure the width/height from that... in a sense that would be like measuring the inlays as if they were actually 'on' the cue just in a 2D view.
 

Scratchy

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
If you have a 4 axis CNC system, there's a program called CNC Wrapper which will convert your choice of axis, probably Y, "xyz" Gcode to use that axis as angular, "xAz", for instance. For relatively small designs, the distortion resulting from the change in diameter inherent in a conical surface is most like tolerable. Larger patterns will probably more obviously show the distortion resulting from taking a Euclidean xyz pattern to a 'non-re ctangular' surface.
If you have cut your paper correctly, the joint and butt ends are not 'straight' lines, but arcs. Any lines perpendicular to the long axis are not straight, but arcs appropriate to the radius at that point.


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Scratchy

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
If you do not have a 4 axis system, there are programs such as Corel Draw where you can plot your design on an. Xyz grid, then distort the image into a trapezoid, a close approximation to your 'unwrapped cone'. You will still need to be wary of large pattern distortion. Probably will be less evident in 'non-geometric' shapes, but things like boxes will have cupped ends unless you specifically change them to arcs of the appropriate radius after the trapezoidal distortion.
HIH,
Mac


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pongohops

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
Scratchy, thanks for responding. I am not the one building this so as far as router specifics I can't really answer that.

What I do know is the inlays will be cut 'down' into the cue - straight up and down. So far what you've said all kind of goes back to who is doing the program for the cuts and how the program is made. I've seen a lot of these cues and they look beautiful with fantastic quality - shapes without distortion - so that must be taken into account at some point. When this whole topic was brought up with me and how the design 'wouldn't be the same' and 'spacing would be different' for this reason that started to get me a little concerned.
 

LGSM3

Jake<built cues for fun
Silver Member
there's a lot more to consider than just scaling your design to a cone. Just be creative and work the math out later. If you need a base to draw on then just draw a trapezoid of the entire cue unwrapped and let the design overlap the sides.
 

pongohops

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
there's a lot more to consider than just scaling your design to a cone. Just be creative and work the math out later. If you need a base to draw on then just draw a trapezoid of the entire cue unwrapped and let the design overlap the sides.

I totally understand there is more to it - a lot more. I am just second guessing everything now and wondering if my flat design 'is enough' to convey how I want it to look. I guess it is up to the person writing the program at this point.
 

Renegade_56

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
I totally understand there is more to it - a lot more. I am just second guessing everything now and wondering if my flat design 'is enough' to convey how I want it to look. I guess it is up to the person writing the program at this point.

Any cue maker with the equipment to cut 4 axis will also have the software to design in 4 axis. Draw your designs out to describe what you want and let the cuemaker you choose do it. If you just want to play with it, have fun, but it's doubtful your result will be useful to a cue maker regarding programming.
 
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