12/6/2021

At work, there were a few smaller parts that they were having trouble welding. Since i had been practicing I decided to see if I could weld together these extrusions. I wanted to challenge myself and could see that whatever practice or research I needed to do would result in trying to make quite a few different shapes by welding this particular piece. Winter was coming up, I knew a snowflake could be made out of this part, and a snowflake is only straight lines so no curves were needed.

FLATS
CORNERS

I started by sketching out 2 different designs. I wanted to choose the flats design because I was afraid to weld the corners design. The corners design means id have to weld 3 edges together. However, I thought the corners design looked better so that’s what I ultimately chose.

Before i could start cutting parts and welding, i would need to figure out how long to make each part. Since the Lights I planned on putting inside came in 2″ increments, i know i would have to cut each part in the same 2″ increments.

such a quick and dirty sketch, “=equal” constraints would have been cleaner than the Σdimensions
I welded the central hex together first. I blew out a couple corners but everything held plenty fine and the lens still fit and completely covered my gap.
Fitting up the dendrites was a little tricky because I did not have a tool called a “pipe notcher”. This means i would have to weld a flat edge to a cylindrical edge I’m happy about this because I got to now try welding across a gap. I was able to weld each joint…..They weren’t pretty, but they held. I used a Dremel with sanding wheel to try and hide some of the ugly.
I had the center hex welded and all the dendrites welded. I snapped the lenses in to see how the piece would look. I end of the dendrites straddle the corner of the hex nicely, which may make this easier to weld than I thought.
Welding the flat cut end of the dendrites to the corners of the central hex was something I thought would be very challenging, but turned out to be much easier. Again, they weren’t pretty at all, but they held more than fine.
Final piece welded and sanded
I knew that the wiring would be easier if i could remove of of the walls of the extrusion. Unfortunately there was no clean way to do this. I had to just butcher the walls off with a Dremel.
To continue the theme of ugly, here are some closeups of the soldering and wiring.
Powering it up and seeing that is coming together and going to look great was a boost I needed to keep working
I probably should have done this before installing the LEDs but I decided to mask, and spray paint the outside of the extrusion white.
When I was done taking my photos and showing my friends, I gave the snowflake to Dragana, the HR lady at work. I knew she would love it and display it for the office to add some winter flair. She set up this beautiful display with the holiday cards the company received.