Free construction SVG files

Machines for birthdays, tools for the trade

Half of this set gets cut for small children who love diggers: the excavator, the bulldozer, the cement mixer and the cone, on birthday shirts, cake toppers and bedroom walls. The machines are drawn from the side with big simple parts, and their wheels and tracks are welded on, so each one lifts as a single piece. For a shirt, 150 to 200 mm wide suits a child’s size.

The other half is for people who do the work: the hard hats, the emblem with a hammer and wrench, and the monogram gear, for lunch boxes, tool chests and truck windows. The tower crane and the brick wall are line drawings with bars about 2.5 mm wide at 100 mm, so cut those two at 120 mm or more in vinyl and larger still in wood.

Stripes that stay in one piece

Cones and barricades are striped, and a stripe cut right across would leave loose pieces. Here every stripe is an open slot that stops just inside the edge, so a thin rim holds the design together. Cut the single-colour cone in orange and stick white behind the slots, or use the layered cone, where the bands are their own pieces.

How to open the files

• Cricut Design Space: choose Upload, pick the SVG, and add it to the canvas. Set the width you want; the shape is already welded.
• Silhouette Studio: Designer Edition and above open the SVG. The free Basic Edition does not, so open the DXF instead.
• LightBurn, xTool Creative Space and Glowforge: import the SVG, then set the layer to cut, score or engrave.
• Inkscape, Illustrator and Affinity: open the SVG. It is a plain filled path, so you can recolour it, add a stroke or combine it with your own work.
• Printing or sublimation: use the PNG, which has a transparent background.

Each design page lists the file’s narrowest part at seven sizes, so you can tell whether it will survive at the size you plan to cut.

Questions