Using kerf offset to make multicoloured acrylic art
Instruction
I made this acrylic elephant to practice using the kerf offset feature in XCS. These settings will vary depending on the material being cut and your machine but can be used as a starting point and tweaked until the perfect fit is achieved.
This elephant design works well for inlaying with different materials as the shapes aren’t too complex and the spaces between are large enough not to break easily during assembly.
Start by setting the orange layer to ignore and cutting out the red and black layers. This will be the background of the finished piece so size of the square on the red layer can be adjusted to make a larger board if wanted.
Now it is time to cut out the orange layer.
If you are using the same material and machine as me, a 5w xTool D1 Pro and 3mm cast acrylic, a kerf setting of 0.12 should make a perfect fit so that the pieces fit tightly together without using any glue.
If you are using a different material or machine I would recommend only cutting out one part until you find the perfect kerf setting. This may take a few attempts so cutting out all of the pieces every time would be time consuming and waste material.