Bukit Pantai Residence
About the Structure
Bukit Pantai Residence is a residential structure based in Kuala Lumpur hillside. The façade consists of aluminum sheets that have been molded to form a ripple effect and circular punctures made for right amount of sunlight to enter. As the weather in the location is warm, these circular perforations help in creating shade and ventilated spaces.
The combination of materials, form, reflectivity and landscape combine to create the impression that the pavilion is floating above the landscape. The external lighting design further enhances this effect at night time. The panels were fabricated in a specialist Guangzhou workshop. The first stage in the process handcrafts clay molds, based on the architect’s 3D model, before using a pneumatic press to form 2.5mm aluminum sheets to the geometry of the mold. The pressed panels are then perforated and powder coated before shipping to site for installation.
Fabrication Process
The façade was fabricated using the CNC Milling machine. CNC Milling takes points as the data to mill the base material. the process that goes in making this design on the CNC Milling includes-
- Choosing right material to work on – MDF is the best for CNC
- Horizontal Roughing by 10mm Upcut Mill
- Parallel Finishing by 12mm Ball Mill
- Hole Profiling by 4mm Upcut Mill
- Axis Pocketing by 14mm Vee Mill
Understanding the process of fabricating
Production Data
Horizontal Roughing – UpCut Mill
Diameter: 10 mm
Spindle Speed: 10000 rpm
Cut Direction: upcut
Stepdown Control (dZ): 50%
Stepover Distance: 40%
Total mill time : 8.08 min
Parallel Finishing – Ball Mill
Diameter: 12 mm
Spindle Speed: 10000 rpm
Cut Direction: mixed
Stepover Distance: 25%
Total mill time : 15.32 min
Hole Profiling – UpCut Mill
Diameter: 4 mm
Spindle Speed: 10000 rpm
Cut Direction: upcut
Hole Diameter: 25.4 mm
Hole Depth: 14 mm
Total mill time : 43.87 min
Axis Pocketing – Vee Mill
Diameter: 19 mm
Spindle Speed: 10000 rpm
Cut Direction: mixed
Stepover Distance: 25%
Cut Depth control: 2 mm
Total mill time : 3.89 min
Production
Credits
Bukit Pantai – CNC Milling is a project of IAAC, Institute for Advanced Architecture of Catalonia developed at the Master in Advanced Architecture in 2020-2021 by students: Shubham Dahedar, Jiaqi Sun, Yasmine Chacour, and faculty: Ricardo Mayor Luque, Lana Awad, Shyam Zonca