Tuesday, March 07, 2017

Video on creating 'coins' with CNC machine

I stumbled across this 9 minute video which shows the process of creating a medallion with realistic bust using a CNC machine.

The medallion produced looks quite good! It looks better than most of the 'coins' featured in do-it-yourself coin making videos. Yet most of the steps made me cringe because I was certain he was doing it the wrong way.

Once he has a 3D model on the computer, he feeds a block of metal to a CNC machine rated only for wood. I was sure something would go wrong but he got it perfect.

To produce the round shape he just takes his metal block and starts hitting it with a belt sander! I was certain he was doomed but it looked very nice when complete.

To give the appearance of patina he uses spray paint. I was amazed that this worked at all! He got a nice effect in the end.

The final medallion suffered a bit of a 'staircase effect' on the face due to the limited depth control. I would have liked to see if he could have removed that with a bit of polishing. Even with the depth artifacts he managed to produce a pretty nice medallion using techniques I would not have expected to be effective.