Test oak curve cut

I wanted to carve a nice spline curve in some White Oak for a dresser, so I first I did a test cut.

For my first attempt, I laid out a block of wood in Fusion 360 with the curve cut out of it, but I struggled to get the 2D contour to only cut out the curved portion --- it wanted to cut out the entire block, which would be bad --- I'm going to do the rest of the block on the chop saw and table saw.

I abandoned my original approach and created a document with only a sketch and a 2D contour. By setting a bottom height I was able to generate multiple 1mm deep cuts with a feed rate of 542.58 mm/min, using a 1/4" straight bit.

Naturally, something went wrong. It didn't cut all the way through, presumably because I measured the depth incorrectly. I resent the g-code after manually lowering the Z-axis, and then realized I really should have set the retract height to be more than 5 mm, because the mill started going through the portion I was cutting out. Fortunately it made it through without missing any steps.

Just like your compiler, if you lie to your CNC mill, it will have its revenge.