Hei's Dagger (Darker than Black Cosplay)

thingiverse

This is a combination project I did as an example of manufacturing processes for my Mechanical Design class, and I'm really proud to show off this cool cosplay prop. The blade is cut from two identical halves made of 0.125" 6061-T6 aluminum plate milled on my X-Carve, polished, and glued together with epoxy to create a strong bond. The hilt is printed in PLA and glued in place with epoxy, sealed with resin, and spray-painted for a smooth finish. The sheath is printed in Filaflex to give it toughness without absolute rigidity, making it perfect for protecting the blade when not in use. Here are the print settings I used: * Printer: Flashforge Creator Pro * Rafts: Yes * Supports: Yes * Resolution: 0.2mm * Infill: 20% for hilt, 10% for sheath Notes on my X-Carve setup: My machine has a 24V silent spindle, and I found that cutting with a 1/8" 2-flute milling bit at a feed rate of 10in/min and depth per pass of 0.003in resulted in the best cuts. Each half of the blade took about 6 hours to complete. After printing, I polished the edge of the blade using a belt sander and file set to create a smooth finish. Don't worry; this is a toy, not a weapon! The edge is blunt, and the point is rounded off for safety. Aluminum won't hold an edge anyway. Next, I glued the halves of the blade together using JB Cold Weld after polishing them. Make sure to clean the surfaces before applying the epoxy, and clamp it for about 20 minutes or according to your chosen epoxy's set time. With the blade epoxy set, you can attach the hilt. Clean all the surfaces of the blade, remove any excess epoxy, and wash it with Acetone to ensure a residue-free surface. Epoxy the hilt over the tang of the blade and clamp it in place. I used an epoxy specifically designed for bonding plastic to metal. Clamp it and let the epoxy cure for its full strength, which is probably around 24 hours. Once cured, sand all the surfaces of the hilt and apply a resin sealant that will allow the spray-paint to bond nicely. Let the resin cure for a couple of hours. Sand the surface of the resin again and wipe it clean with a soft cloth. Now you can spray paint in thin layers for the effect you want, using painters tape to protect the blade while painting the hilt and vice-versa. I use Acetone to prep the blade before spraying paint. I designed this project using Solidworks! To transfer the blade model from Solidworks to Easel was a bit of a challenge, but here's how I did it: First, I exported a DXF file of the outline sketch in Solidworks. Next, I converted the DXF file to an SVG for Easel by opening it directly in Inkscape and applying a scale factor of 24.5 due to my Imperial units. Make sure all the endpoints of segments are joined so that the outside of the blade is a continuous poly-line. Save the image as a Standard SVG, and you're ready to import it perfectly into Easel!