Box making with Gypsy or DS

Some of you may have been wondering what I was doing for the past few days if you had visited me during last 2 days and thinking to yourself is she out of her mind Hope you did not feel dizzy. I am sorry as I was changing and trying out layouts.
Well coming back to the topic. I said that I will show you some welding snapshots from DS (easier taking screen shots than taking out the camera)
Lets look at making box from welding and construction angle. We have to decide on the size and max size can be a square box of about 3.8 inches for 12 inch mat ie 11.5/3 as we have a workable area as only 11.5.
You can choose a rectangle too.
Here I have chosen a square box initally as it's easy to figure . But based on this you can easily calculate any box and design. I am going to keep the box 3.5 inches. File can be downloaded in .cut and .gypsy from my site. Principle is the same in gypsy and DS
Box
Let's start with center square of 3.5 inches (unlink the aspect ratio and choose real dial size)
Note down the x and y value. To remember better I placed it at x - 4.0 and y - 4.0.

I generally leave about 0.15 inches for welding. So taking that into account for the top and bottom side- the squares should be width 3.5 and height - 3.65. ( I make one box and then copy the other) .You can drag and place them at the top and bottom. Take care of the x axis. It should be the same as the x axis of the  middle square - ie in this case 4.0.

Now for the left and right side. It's almost the same but this time the width is 3.65 and height 3.5 and we now have to keep the y axis same as the y axis of center square - so y is now 4.0

Now for the tabs. Choose a tab like polygon ie an isoceles trapezoid- in this case shift lock - button 25. (george)  .Gypsy wanderings also has a similar shape.- creative feature 2 ie scalloped square button 29.
This needs adjusting. Height of tab will be 0.5 + 0.15 ie 0.65 for welding but the width will be a little more than 3.5. Fine tune one and then make 3 copies and paste either in clockwise or anticlockwise each to one side like I've shown in the picture below.

Now remember the welding order I mentioned in. It should be grouped and welded from center to the outside
Same in DS. You could have had the weld checked from beginning or after adding all figures then select center square and click weld and then outer squares etc. Now for the lid.
Lid
The center square size of the lid depends on the thickness of material used. For regular cardstock it can be 0.2 inches bigger and for thicker cardstock upto 0.3 inches bigger.
Here you can have a fancy sides or plain sides. The center will remain the same and the sides is limited only by your imagination. I have chosen to go with plain for this project and the depth as 1 inch. So the same principle goes.
Select a new page. (In DS goto view and click new page. Then on the mat right click and change name in the appropriate box and press enter and in Gypsy just click the + on the top left of the mat in the gray area).
Center square  3.7 inches (real dial size with aspect link off). Take note of x and y axis. For top and bottom the height will be 1.15 inches and the width 3.7 and x axis same as center square. (make one and copy the other). For the left and right side width is  1.15 and height 3.7 and now y axis is same as center square.
Tabs similar to box . I make one - copy 3 more and then rotate and attach it to each side - in this case I went anticlockwise. Just pay attention that the width of tab does not protrude beyond the width of the rectangle side it's attached to ( after taking into account of adding the 0.15 inches to tab height and considering that 0.15 of the rectangle for side is gone to center square - so play and attach). Here too group and wed from center.

When you choose your own designs for the sides you also have to make the tab suitable for the design. If it's real flowery then you can always cut the basic and then cut out by hand parts that will show or just fine tune a template after cutting one piece.
So have fun in making the box