Polyboard is very good for designing and manufacturing cabinets. Building standard cabinets for kitchens, bathrooms, and other custom units is a breeze.

But Polyboard also has some very neat features that can make adding original decorative effects easy and fast.

One of those features is the Surface Split command that enables you to cut a board up into any number of parts and work individually on each part.

When you see that the cutting line can also be any shape it’s time to let your imagination run wild.

Here’s a short video to just outline and give an inkling to what you can do:

Using the Surface Split command

Basic set up of the Surface Split

In this video we start with a simple box cabinet with a single door. With that door selected, all you need to do is go over to the Properties menu > Structure > Edit, and select Surface Split.

First up, you can select the green Plus button and add extra panels (by splitting the single door panel you started with).

For each new panel, you can apply extra parameters to them as a group, or for even more flexibility check the Individualise Divisions Parameters box and edit each in turn.

Multiple options to play with

Typically, when they are all grouped, you’ll want to define the slack between each panel. You can also change their angle, that’s the angle of the division between each panel.

You can apply edging to the panel edge, and hardware across the panels. Normally though, rather than updating each unit in turn you would define these preferences in your manufacturing methods and apply them automatically. These methods act as style sheets and contain all your construction preferences.

Get creative

To get really creative apply a shape to the edge of each panel, change the dimensions so they aren’t all equal, and of course independently define the material for each.

The latest version of Polyboard allows you to link a design (‘structure’) like this with a panel type. This enables you to apply them in their entirety and automatically, also using the software’s manufacturing methods.

What’s nice about these features in Polyboard is that they are very quick to apply. You can create some really nice and completely unique panel designs without taking a long time to set everything up in a traditional CAD package.

And of course, as soon as you’ve finished your design all the manufacturing output – cut list, plans and CNC files – are ready to output.

Go to this page for a general overview of Polyboard cabinet software.

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