cribbage players

I enjoy playing cribbage!

it is a fun game, perfect for long cold winters and nights at deer camp!

yeah, that gets into WAY expensive for cheapskates.  lots of manual labor involved in that, pushing the price way up, up, up!

(1) mill the holes for the magnets, twice as deep as they are think, plus some for glue.

(2) ALL magnets must stack the same way (or all the tiles won't work in each location)

(3) glue in the bottom of the hole, then a stack of 2 magnets in the hole (only the bottom touching the glue, hope it doesn't squeeze up at all!)

(4) glue on the top of the top magnet

(5) center the tile on the magnet, then let it all dry

It would be 120 holes + 240 magnets just for that one I pictured.

Yeah, that's a LOT of manual labor and a LONG time making any set up of size (say, 21"x21", the best side for my machine to give me a nice cleanup).

Last night, after I shut off the machine, I started altering the tile file.  Like I said, the milling wasn't working, so I laser cut them out.  Well, they can be butted up touching to laser them, that gives 0.010" (roughly) spacing between tiles placed on the board, should work just fine, and it saves a lot of board.  I can get 2.7mm thick plywood where I get my normal wood, 4x8 sheet is $23, and I can get over 3600 hexes out of a sheet (1" across the flats) or 4800+ with 1" across the points.  I don't have any hex mats to see which way they are made, and that info isn't on Amazon!  It would take time to cut them, and I think I would like the whiter plywood over the darker hardboard.  But, I won't make any big units until the one I have is play tested, if it doesn't seem to be viable, then no point in wasting time & material.

I guess there is some labor involved... I would just make my kids do that part though 

I asked the DM in discord which way they are.

1" across the flats I guess, a 1" round base fits inside it on his game mat. 

thanks for the info.  I have designs for both ways.  the 1" across the points would make a smaller board, more hexes (obviously), but for just a mapping board would probably work, then do 1" across the flats for the play board, which would only be laser etching, no tiles.

had an interesting thought last night....

IF I use that 2.7mm thick plywood to cut out the individual tiles, the SCRAP can be glued ON TOP of a piece of 1/2" MDF to make the boundaries, then no need to mill the MDF.  Put the MDF on the machine, put the plywood on top, then laser etch the paths on the plywood, then laser cut out the tiles, but going an extra pass deep and it will etch the hexes on the MDF at the same time.  You then have a white surface surrounding the map field, you have a dark un-mapped map field until you place the white tile on the board.

Thats pretty clever. Post some pics after you try it out. 

gotta find the time!  busy this weekend with family stuff, and I have to drive to my wood source (about 45 minutes each way!).  Soon though, I do have some vacation coming up, the week of Memorial Day.  I'll have to time the process as I charge by time & material.  I round material up, $7.50/foot for 1x12, I round up to $10, then I charge $10 machine time.  So, if it takes 4 hours, that's $40 then add in the cost of the wood.  For a 24x24 board that would be $5 for the plywood plus the MDF.  With no milling on the MDF could go down to 1/4" instead of 1/2" so, $10 for that.  So, materials would be $15, so the time factor would be the biggest cost.  Could put it on hardboard instead for a little cheaper and might even hold up better.  lots of things to look at!

going to my buddies house on Sunday, his daughter will be there as well as a few other RPG players.  Going to take that small 12x12 trial I made and we'll see how well it plays.  not sure if it will be used Sunday, but between the two of them one or the other has a game every couple weeks.  if they like it, then the next step will be to make the full size board and see if the local game shop will offer it up for sale, or let me put a flyer in the store, or something.

Awesome! I hope they like it! 

Matthew D. Hoedeman 

Matthew D. Hoedeman 

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I've currently got about two dozen designs for this (maybe more!).  They looked at the 12x12 hex setup I made, mostly liked it, gave some feedback, so, re-working / re-designing had to happen.  Back in the day, everything was hexes.  neither of them use hexes anymore, just squares (I like the hexes better, but I'm not running the game!).  Designs are done in a couple different ways and sizes.  Last weekend I resurfaced the spoil boards (worst job because MDF cuts like chalk, dust EVERYWHERE even with the dust boot & shop-vac running) and added 2 boards to mostly cover the entire machine bed so that I have a nice, level playing field for 24x48 inch sheets.  I tried with my (small 7W) laser to burn out some tiles, fail, too much burn, not enough cut, so that required a re-design of all of them to change to milling out the tiles.  I bought a full sheet of 2.7mm plywood and have it cut into 24x48 sheets to fit the machine.  I have a couple 24x48 sheet of hardboard for the bottom.  I've thought about getting rolls of stick-on magnet that you cut to size, stick them on the back of the tiles, then they can use a magnetic whiteboard for the build surface.  Yeah, still working on "perfect" but just maybe doing some tiles Saturday to take to a game on Sunday.  Mostly, I don't want to do a 'big' project until all the annoying little bugs are worked out.

So... Progress! 

OK, so, I have a 12x12 design (12 squares in 11", 1/2" per side boarder).  I burned then cut out all the tiles.  The only thing I had available for the base plate was 1/8" hard board.  Yeah, too thin, not the best, but this is a trial board.  very shallow pocket in the hardboard and laser lines every (11/12) inches.  In addition to the small 1-sq tiles, I also made some that fit 2x2 squares (see below)

base board:

with some tiles:

it will work much better with a thicker base board.  Also, the laser lines are slightly off in the base board, had an issue with the fan in the laser, had to take the column mount off, now I need to calculate the laser offset again.

That's looking good! 

Thanks.

After I got that done, I started designing TETRIS (r) shaped tiles for it.

I also ordered some 0.8" self-adhesive square magnets (cheap, going to test them) and am thinking about ordering a magnetic white board (<$25 @ 24"x36") and seeing if I can laser etch the surface.  That would be pretty cool, then the tiles will stick and the board can be put away from the next session.

Have you seen the spray that lets you laser reflective surfaces? (can't for the life of me remember what its called) 

I've seen those, and it will depend on the laser.  I have a diode laser, it is less useful than the other types.  works great on wood, doesn't work on plastic (but I only tried once, power & speed settings would need to be adjusted) and the white board isn't reflective, it a white coating on the metal underneath.  those sprays are white (the ones I've seen anyway), so, it is hopeful that it would work on the white board since it is not reflective (well, not much, anyway) and it only needs to make marks that won't wipe off.  the other option is pin-striping, but that would suck!