In my Advanced Model Building course, all students were provided with the same CAD file of a stool designed by the professor. The objective was to fabricate the stool solely from the provided digital model, without making any design modifications.

For this build, I selected zebrawood for the seat. The woodworking process involved milling, planing, joinery, gluing, and finishing with oil to highlight the material’s natural grain. To achieve the contoured depth of the seat, I used a custom router jig to remove material in a controlled manner, simulating a CNC machining process through manual fabrication.

The metal frame was constructed from steel tubing. I designed and fabricated custom jigs to accurately cut the mitered joints, then assembled the frame using MIG welding. Despite getting my hand pulled into a vertical belt sander and getting my finger crushed, I completed the latter half of the project while maintaining high precision and fabrication quality.

The project is titled Stribet, derived from the Danish word for “striped,” referencing the distinctive grain pattern of the zebrawood.

Date

Winter 2024

Hardware

Planer, Jointer, Router, Belt sander, Sand blaster, Table saw, Chop saw, MIG welder, Angle grinder, Die grinder, Bandsaw, Laser cutter

Materials

Zebra wood, Steel tube/bars, Paint, Lacker, Bondo, Wood glue, Stool feet, Plywood, M4 screws