Material Nesting
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All sheet-based material processes like waterjet cutting, CNC routing, and laser cutting benefit from efficient material use through effective nesting.
Cost of Materials
Financial cost
The Maker Space aims to provide free materials (where reasonable!) for staff and students at the University so there are no barriers to learning. Excessive material waste is not acceptable though - you should treat the material as if you had bought it with your own money. When parts and designs are cut in an inefficient manner (such as by cutting holes in the middle of fresh sheets of material) there is a substantial cost involved in buying new replacement material.
Environmental cost
All consumables have an non-negligible impact on the environment. Nesting your parts effectively and efficiently means that fewer raw materials are required to make stock for use.
A lot of the materials used, especially in CO2 laser cutting, are not directly recyclable and therefore enter the general waste stream. Some materials (such as plywood and MDF) may be redirected from landfill to be burned in incineration plants but others like acrylic and laminated signwriting plastic are difficult to recycle.
Use offcuts before cutting into a new sheet
Our main laser cutter - the Epilog Fusion Pro 48 - has a pair of cameras affixed to the lid. These allow you to use offcuts very effectively - simply place the offcuts on the bed of the laser and carefully position your designs using the Epilog Dashboard software. In Dashboard it is possible to "break apart" a design to split it over several pieces of material if needed.