Custom 3D Settlers of Catan board from scrap plywood

Settlers of Catan is a family strategy boardgame for 3-4 players. It has a clever modular board that is arranged differently each time you play. Settlers has inspired many different 3D versions; the board represents an island with 6 different terrain types, so it is the perfect game to model, be it out of resin or cupcakes. Searching the wider web will reveal literally dozens of versions, many exquisitely modeled, and even a commercial version which sold for over $300. OK, Settlers is hardly chess, but it's off to a decent start.

The board described here was made from scrap plywood, wood glue, inexpensive acrylic paint and some leftover polyurethane.

Step 1 Why?

The board that comes with the 4th edition of Settlers has hexagons and a border made of light cardboard. A few boisterous kids and a little warping and the game can be pretty frustrating to play. My initial fix was to glue the border down to a large hexagon of plywood (see pictures).
We usually buy a family board game for Christmas, but this year I thought I'd try my hand at making a 3D Settlers set out of materials I had lying around. If you want to make one like it, you'll still need a copy of the game! It's easy to find online or at bookstores.

Comments

[Celestianpower]

This is amazing! I'm currently in the process of making my own (though I'm cheating and getting the hexagons cut for me...) I'll upload a picture when I'm done! Thanks for inspiring me!

[makendo]

Thanks, & good luck with the build. Good idea to get the hexagons cut - they're the trickiest bit to get right, for sure.

[Spaceman Spiff]

Now I need to buy an Indiana Jones Lego piece! "That belongs in a museum!" Ha Ha.

[makendo]

Yep, he'll save you having to set your death ray blaster to Deep Fat Fry.

[careforapint]

Wow, Very inspirational! Thanks for posting.

[sbiickert]

Thanks a million for posting this! I followed along and made my own board. The only real difference with mine is I didn't try for a round board, and I changed up the pasture and hills. Look for the sheep on the pasture!!! :-)

http://www.flickr.com/photos/43721019@N07/5814203702/

Simon

[makendo]

Simon - fantastic, it looks great! You've made my day! :)

[Eye Poker]

I'm done with the hexes, terrain and base coat of paint!

[makendo]

Awesome! I'd love to see it... post a picture if you can.

[nolte919]

Could you make the tiles round?  It would be tons easier and it seems you could put the settlements in the spaces between circles.  I might be missing something, I've never played the game.  Although thanks to this 'ible I ordered one. :-)

[Eye Poker]

I imagine that if you made a large hexagonal base with a lip cut to just the right size the circular tiles would fit in it tight to make the board.

[makendo]

Absolutely! In fact when I first thought about making this board, I was going to make something that looked like one of those fancy wine racks. However, the reality of making perfectly aligned circular holes in a board, then making circles that fitted them exactly, proved beyond me. A laser would be be ideal, but to do it conventionally would have required me buying a drill press and some hole cutters. If you just close-pack the circles without putting them in holes, I think you'd have issues with the settlements dropping out of sight.
It's a great game, glad to hear you bought a copy. Enjoy!

[Eye Poker]

All you need to do is find a circle the size you want. Use it as a template with a round off bit on your router to make as many circles as you want.

[makendo]

Agreed, but cutting the circles wasn't the problem I envisaged - it was cutting the holes in the sheet. The problem with just having a bunch of discs pushed together is that putting down the roads/settlements/cities is likely to be problematic.

[Eye Poker]

The rads would balance in between the circles. There would be a small open space between the circle where the cities would go.

[thepelton]

I made some hexes for a friend using my Epilog laser. I hope this attaches their file to the comment. I have to find out how I can make them without running afoul of a copyright, otherwise, I would make them for anyone.

[makendo]

Nice interlocking lasercut tiles for Settlers of Catan have recently been posted on Thingiverse, including the cutting file.

[thepelton]

As soon as I leave the library where I am doing these comments on instructables, I plan to go to the local Woodcraft store and get some dyes or paints for those hexes. I will rephotograph them when I am done, and show it off here.

[thepelton]

The waveform pieces are all on the backs of the other pieces, except for the one desert piece.

[makendo]

Good way to cut perfect hexagons. I don't think you need to be concerned about copyright; you'll still need a copy of the game to play on your new board.

[thepelton]

On those hexes, one has waveforms on it so it can be ocean, and another has brick pattern on it for a clay brick deposit.

[RedBeardatXMission]

(removed by author or community request)

[thepelton]

I prevent kick back on cross cutting with a table saw by screwing a long cheap board to the cross cut guide which will support both pieces of the wood before and after cross cutting. I also wait until the blade is stopped before reaching for the wood, to save my cut wood pieces, not to mention my fingers.

[EmmettO]

 I've taken shop classes and I regularly cut without any guards in place. Knowledge and training does not ensure adherence to that training.

Now excuse me as I sit too close to the TV and then later I've got a running with scissors engagement to go to!

[Jayefuu]

That wasn't the most tactful way of saying that....

[makendo]

Don't panic; the guard, anti-kickback devices, riving knife and pushstick are all out of shot. You can see them all in place here. 
For those of us less experienced than Redbeard,  en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Table_saw has lots of sound safety exhortations.

[AngryRedhead]

Have you thought about making a silicon mold of the pieces just for the heck of it?

 

[thepelton]

Someone was making silicon molds for catan pieces in another Instructable. Just look around.

[makendo]

 No; I carefully read homechicken's account of his construction of a 3D set, and decided it was way beyond my modeling and painting skills. It never occurred to me to use the plywood pieces as the pattern, but you certainly could and it would necessitate much less cutting of small plywood bits.
I have, however, thought about getting the parts laser-cut from acrylic in different colours; I think it could look awesome, especially set up with digital dice and LEDs that lit up the correct tiles from underneath :)

[cincodenada]

Man, now I want to make a sweet version of this with some clever microcontrollering...I'd have to be cautious of making it to electronic-y, Settlers is a very earthy, hands-on game.  But a microcontroller would be sweet just to randomize the board - put some LEDs under each position, that would be color-coded for each type, hit a button, and it gives you a random board.  
And I like the wooden pieces a lot - you could keep the wooden pieces, but somehow have a very thin layer of wood under the number chit, and light them up when they're rolled (if you do digital dice), which would be easy to do if you do the setup thing.  Or maybe light up the edges, shine through the gaps between the pieces (which would be harder to do).

Heck, you could make a fancy set of dice that you actually roll, but are detectable as to which side they land on, and have that light them up!  First I'd have to figure out how to do that though :P

[thepelton]

There is an electronic set of dice that light up twelve LEDS in two groups. The circuit is available at radio shack and probably some dice sales websites.

[AngryRedhead]

Really?  I don't think it would be so bad with yours considering how minimalist it is and how you already have the pieces constructed, and you could dye the resin/epoxy to avoid painting it.  Tetranitrate used wood for making his tetris ice cubes, and you could totally make the molds, use clear epoxy, and rig up some LEDs for a very crazy effect.  Of course, that's extra work when you already have a set.  However, I bet you could make the molds and sell the boards on Etsy or eBay or somewhere.  From the links you posted, there seems to be a market for these - I've actually never heard of the game before, but meh, I'm not a good sample.  Actually I'm a really bad sample.  :-P

 

[Ward_Nox]

yea that was kinda what i was thinking of but using colored plexi glass

[makendo]

 Yes, we were on the same wavelength - acrylic and plexiglass are the same thing. Before I came up with the scrollsaw solution, I thought I might be able to get the whole thing cut out with a laser - however, all that glue in plywood makes it hard work to cut, so it seems that 3 mm plywood is the upper limit - not robust enough for a board, and requiring too many layers to model in 3D. However, lasers cut acrylic like a knife does butter, and the various places that do laser cutting seem to offer it in lots of different colours.

[thepelton]

Acrylic hexes could be and acrylic wouldn't hurt my epilog laser. I may just make some using acrylic. 8>)

[makendo]

I like the idea of the dyed resin. Interesting; I'll look into it. No cutting AND no painting... the perfect project for me!
Settlers has sold 15 million copies, at least according to the Wikipedia - it's a decent game :)

[Ward_Nox]

well you make one use it to make the molds for the rest

you might want to thicken up the base though so the resin quarries don't have a hole in em

then yo could under light the whole thing

[AngryRedhead]

Phew!  That's a lot of copies!

 

[thepelton]

If done on an Epilog laser, you don't have to make them one at a time. It is run by a computer graphics program in which you can duplicate something many times over by clicking and dragging. I wanted a lot of copies of some small one inch squares for a game. I made over a hundred square in pieces from 3mm plywood out of a chunk of the stuff about the size of a piece of typing paper (8.5x11 inch.) Right now, I'm waiting for a mailing of a few "catan" pieces so I can get a good idea of their size, and make a bunch of 3mm thick plywood hexes to expand a catan game, possibly to eleven hexes across at the widest. Of course, if someone gave me the dimensions of a catan hex, I could get going on that even faster. (Hint, Hint) I plan to make a photo of the pieces when I finish them, so I can show them here. 8>)

[makendo]

79 mm