Laser-cut Cardboard Part Organizers

If you are like me, you are always trying to think of a better way to organize and store all of your "stuff". This is especially true if you like to dabble in a bunch of different making activities. For me that dabbling includes 3D printing, building quadcopters and airplanes from scratch, designing and protoyping different types of robot platforms and playing around with microcontroller boards.

So I inevitably find that I have drawers and boxes and cabinets that overflow with motors (brushed, brushless, servos and steppers), boards (arduino unos, rasberry pi's, feathers, trinkets, etc.) and sensors (acceleration, pressure, tilt, light, IR, termperature, etc), parts for printers, cables, nuts, bolts screws, pulleys, belts, gears, wheels, servo horns, and the list goes ever onward.

So when I saw this challenge my thoughts turned toward organization - specialized modular organization that would be both inexpensive and relatively easy to design and fabricate.

• Sheets of good quality cardboard. While its not critical, it is helpful if the sheets all have the same thickness. There are, of course, many sources of cardboard but for a project like this you may consider purchasing sheets of cardboard. Some sources are:
• McMaster Carr
• Staples
• Glue gun and glue sticks. You will want a good quality glue gun so that you can extrude a fair amount of glue in one operation.
• Laser cutter with a bed of at least 12" x 12"
• Some type of CAD software (Fusion 360, Solidworks, etc.)
• Caliper or ruler
• Duct tape

The initial step is to determine the types of parts that what to organize. For this example step, I chose a set of microcontoller boards and shields that up to now have existed in a jumble within a plastic storage container.

The set of parts should then be laid out on a flat surface in a pattern that approximates the way they should fit in the modular storage tray. I find it helpful to then take a picture of this layout so that I can refer to it while I am creating the CAD drawing.

The CAD drawing that you will make can simply consist of a series of rectangles, but you can also create shapes that exactly match the contours of an item. For this example, I chose to use only different size rectangles and one circle.

I first decided on an overall size of 14" x 9". This area encompassed the part layout but otherwise is completely arbirary. The size of these modular trays will be driven by types of parts that you want the tray to hold and the manner in which you want to store them.

Use your CAD package to create this initial rectangle and then place additional shapes inside of it that match the size and shape of the individual components that you laid out in Step 1. Use a caliper or ruler to determine the size of each shape. I added an extra 1/8" to the height and width of each rectangle so that the parts are not too snug. If the parts you are storing are fragile, you can reduce this value so that the parts have less room to move about.

Once all the rectangles have been sized, I used sketch dimensions to fix their positions. In most cases, I have used a spacing of 1/2" between each part. Depending on your needs, this spacing could be reduced to 1/4".

Once the sketch has been created, you can go straight to the next step and laser cut the plate, however, I chose to create an assembly so that I could see a full 3D image of the tray. The cardboard I am using has a thickness of 0.15" and the thickest board had a dimension of 1.10" inches. This means that this tray requires a stack of 8 plates for a total thickness of 1.20 inches.

The assembly includes two 14" x 9" sheets that are used as the bottom and lid of the tray.

Cut the cardboard stock to rough size and then use the laser cutter and the cad drawing to cut the inividual plates. The example requires eight sheets.

You will also need to cut two 14" x 9" sheets. One sheet is for the bottom of the tray and the other will be used as the lid.

Begin the assembly process by placing a strip of duct tape on one of the the long ends of the solid sheet that will be the bottom of the tray. The tape should cover about 1/2 inch of the sheet. Rotate the sheet up to form an L-shape so that the rest of the strip of duct tape is visible.

The image shows the tape attached to the bottom plate with the first couple of inner sheets attached to the duct tape binding.

The process is akin to adding pages to a book where each page is being connected to the binding. Here the binding is the strip of duct tape.

Once all the sheets have been inserted, strengthen the binding by adding a strip of duct tape to the edge of the top sheet and folding it down onto the binding.

The sheets should open as if they are pages in a book. You will now glue them together to create a solid tray.

Begin by adding a thin bead of glue to the perimeter of the bottom sheet. Then close the book and apply even pressure. You may find if helpful to use a large book or a sheet of plywood to apply the proessure.

Next add a bead of glue to the perimeter of the next sheet. Depending on the type of grid you have, you may want to add a bead to one or more of the inner strips. Again close the book and apply even pressure.

Repeat this process until all the sheets have been glued and you have a solid tray.

Next attached the lid piece using two strips of duct tape. One strip should be on the outer side of the lid and should be folded down onto the binding.

The other strip should be in the inner side of the lid and should connect to the top of the tray. This is shown in the figure.

At this point the tray is complete, but you may want to adjust the height of the individual components using the pieces of cardboard that were cut out of each sheet.

Since this may be the start of a complete storage system, you may want to add a name plate to the front of the tray.

Depending on how you plan on using the storage trays you may want to include a means to secure the lid. This can be accomplished by adding some hook and look strips or you may want to get fancy and add some magnets to the lid.

Lots of room for modifications!

I hope you like the idea. Please let me know of any improvements that you come up with!