I've had the Creality Raptor 3D scanner in the shop for a little while, and I'm slowly finding ways to take advantage of its unique capabilities. Here's one that came up recently.
This Hummingbird came into the shop with a broken headstock. The break was easy to re-glue, but it was missing a small wedge of mahogany.
Using the Raptor, I was able to make a detailed scan of the cavity and produce a piece with the exact topology to replace just the wood that was missing.
Scanning the cavity
The break, re-glued and missing a wedge.The break itself was easy to re-glue — but a small wedge of mahogany was gone, leaving a cavity that had to be filled with wood rather than putty.
The scanned cavity in Creality Scan.
The same scan, rotated.
Here's how the scans appear in the Creality Scan software. I've removed everything but the area I need for making the patch.
Cutting the patch
The mesh imported into Fusion 360.I then imported the mesh scan into Fusion to generate a CNC toolpath. I start out with roughing passes to remove the bulk of the material, then finish with the smallest round-nose bit I can manage. In this case I went down to 0.25 mm to capture as much detail as possible.
Roughing passes.
The finishing pass at 0.25 mm.
The patch, cut to the topology of the cavity.
Gluing it in
Test-fitting the patch.With the patch done, I removed it from the larger block and glued it in place with hot hide glue. I chose not to clamp it, worried the clamping might pull it out of alignment.
Seated with hot hide glue.It fit like a puzzle piece, so it was easy to feel when it was seated correctly. I pressed it in place, allowed a minute for the glue to gel, and then set it aside to dry.
The patch glued in place.
This is how the patch appeared after bringing it flush with the surface.
Finishing
With the patch leveled I began by sealing it with shellac. I then applied an oil-based grain filler made using Ian Davlin's recipe (Tru-Oil mixed with pumice and ColorTone/TransTint liquid dye). I then applied shellac tinted with ColorTone/TransTint Cherry Red to achieve the color, and clear coated with StewMac ColorTone clear nitrocellulose lacquer.
The color-matched patch, straight on.
At an angle, the grain shift shows.
A third angle.The three views above are the same repair — the slight shift you can see is the patch's grain running differently from the surrounding mahogany, not a mismatch in color.
The final result
Back together.
The repaired area at normal viewing distance.
Professionally attended to.
Overall I am very happy with the results, particularly not having to remove any material for the patch. Despite my best efforts there is some color shift in the light due to differing grain orientation, but I think it looks “professionally attended to,” as Frank Ford would say.
I continue to be impressed with the Creality Raptor scanner and am getting faster at scanning and processing the files. I still have a lot to learn about it, but it is clear that it will be helpful in a variety of repairs that come through the shop.