Making boxes

[codefoster]

Does anyone have any guidance on creating tabbed edges for easy to assemble laser cut boxes? I'm thinking of the same kind of thing that you get from a tool like http://hackaday.com/2012/07/26/box-maker-extension-for-inkscape/ where it notches each face of a box corner so you can then laser cut it and it will just snap together. If you're making a simple box, you may as well use the Inkscape tool and that box maker extension, but I'm thinking of complex designs that I want to create in F360 and then export faces to laser cut.

[codefoster]

I just did what I'm talking about via a rather manual process. I used the inner faces of the box to "Split Body" until the corners where separate from each face. Then I made horizontal construction planes at 25%, 50%, and 75% down the box and cut the corner into fourths. Then I joined the newly cut corner pieces (tabs) with the body faces. It worked, but I'm wondering if there's a better way.

My next effort might be to cut the entire box with the horizontal construction planes and then do the edge cuts only to the pieces that apply, but then I have to combine the pieces of the faces, so I think that's just as much work.

[laughingcreek]

That's getting really close to a work flow I use for some joints I make using a CNC router.  I basically create a separate model with a body that is in the shape of the joint lines.  I can then drop it in to my design and use it to cut the model into the right shape.  I made a very crude screen cast illustrating what I'm talking about.  In this case I just used surfaces in conjunction with the "split body" tool.  In practice,  i actually use bodies with some thickness (a few thousands of an inch) in conjunction with the "join bodies" tool.  This approach allows the tool to be used over, and if you create the tool in parametric mode it can be customisable.

https://screencast.autodesk.com/Main/Details/09b496d1-6c1d-4cb6-a42c-492fc2527a98  

[TrippyLighting]

How about this workflow ?