For this week I’ve decided to make the Iris Box from Instructables. The hardest part about this build is that some of the specifics about the nuts and bolts are missing, so after about half hour at Orchard Supply Hardware I took my best guess and bought the materials. Besides the screws being a little bit too short, I think I did alright.

Here is a picture of all of the parts after being laser cut.

The first step was to glue the bottom piece to the ring that held the nuts, and that piece to a ring with guide holes. This will be the top part of the box that the screws screw into.

Here I am using the screws to make sure all the rings line up perfectly.

Let it sit for about 10 minutes to makes sure the glue has had time to cure, at least a little bit.

The next part I worked on was the bottom. The bottom has two pieces, one large enough for the screw heads to fit through, and another to guide the threading. The screw heads were a little bit too large to fit all the way through the bottom, so I took a drill and made the holes just a little bit bigger.

After that I glued the bottom piece with the large holes to a disk with holes for the thread. This was assembled with the screws in place to make sure everything lined up correctly.

Let it sit for around 10 minutes.

Next I worked on the gears and closing lid. I once again used a screw to line up the gear with the lid, and used a single tooth on each lid piece to make sure the gears were positioned correctly. All the gears had to be set in the same position in order for the lid to open smoothly.

I only needed 5 gear/lid parts, but I decided to make some extra in case I had a misaligned gear or two. As with all glue parts make sure to let it sit so it can cure properly.

I forgot to take a picture of gluing all the layers together. but I just put all the screws through the bottom pieces and glued on each layer one at a time. I ended up having one extra later of hollow rings due to my screws being a little too small. Here is what I’ve got so far:

A test fit to make sure all the gears fit correctly.

Success! Although I did have to grind back some of the teeth so I could get all the pieces in there.

Finished box!