Ideation
In the Spring 2026 semester, MIT announced the closure of The Deep, one of my favorite machine shops to work at. My fellow mentors and I threw a funeral for the space, as a way to celebrate the space and Seth Avecilla’s great contribution to it. I wanted to create a physical memory of the space and the amazing opportunities it had given people.
Design
I settled on a CNCed plate with letters using waterjet garnet, resin-casted machining chips, machined dice (the starter project for our mill training), broken tooling, and purple resin (The Deep’s color). I also created a contour of a squid’s tentacles in the top right corner to memorialize the Deep’s mascot, a Kraken.
Manufacturing
I began by creating a CAD model of the plate and all its modular letters. CAD below!
I generated my first ever CAM program to create the plate. It involves a series of pocket, contour, and engraving operations. The entire program is 30 minutes long, and I didn’t break a tool during its run (not even the 1/32” ball endmill)! CAM simulation and machining videos below:
Results
Putting together everything with resin, I ended with this final gift for Seth. I think it perfectly encapsulates The Deep and was a very exciting project to make since it included a wide variety of manufacturing methods.