DIY
Things you can make yourself
I’m always happy when I find a new kind of part that is cheap and easy to use with DIY electronics projects or robotics, the more standardized the better. There’s a whole world of smart electronics and helper things in the hobby and remote control world that are great for robots and other things. You probably already know that hobby servos are easy to control from any microcontroller like the arduino, but there are a bunch of other things that are just as easy to use. Generic motor controllers, battery systems are also equally as useful, but are...
Over the last week I’ve been working on the next version of the Jansen Walker, this will be the 3rd release.
The goal is to make it much easier to assemble, faster, and 1/3rd larger using 3mm (1/8in) material.
The biggest change is that instead of using modified servos, which seem to scare a lot of people off, use geared motors which are about the same price. That will make the electronics side easier, perhaps slightly more expensive depending on your controls.
The new version will use the Tamiya Twin-Motor Gearbox, that has a good 203:1 ratio that is ideal...
For Christmas this year I made some custom toy blocks with friends and family initials. The blocks were cut from square wood stock into 1.25in cubes. The stock I used was indented for banisters, and had peg ends, but they were easily cut off. I made a batch of both Oak and Fir. Oak turned out fine, and is what is pictured here. The Fir blocks came out with a more slightly more desirable finish since the end grain was more smooth after sanding. Setup First I taped down a...
Every now and then everyone needs to take a photo of something small, there’s an easy (and cheap!) way to get a great looking photo with a white background. As soon as you see the technique, it’s hard to forget, it’s a plain white poster board propped up against a wall or whatever you have handy. Fill your camera’s view with the poster board and take the photo. For lighting you’ll need a reflected flash or some bright lights, but that is not the focus of this article. I’ll soon do an article on my...
The holidays are a undoubtedly a a big cost every year for me, but this year I decided to try something different, I wanted to make all my gifts, or give things that are new but unused. My quest was a success, I effectively bought no new packaged items. I did buy some raw materials, but no packaged things. Thingiverse.com was a big help, and I also produced a few things I designed, including: Earphone Holder by 4volt Gothic Bookends by 4volt Little Business Card Stand by oomlout DIY iPhone stand... by...
For Christmas this year I’ll be giving out inexpensive things I’ve cut with my laser, here’s one of the original designs I’ve come up with, a small holder for earbud style earphones.
Other earphone winder designs make you wrap your chord around and around until you’ve wrapped the whole chord. That way is pretty aquard, and I never end up using them. It really is quite a bit faster to “fold” then to “loop”.
This winder/holder is designed for that with a hook on one side, and a strap in the middle. Although, you can still wrap them the other way...
If you follow this blog you’ll know I do a lot of stuff with my cheap $1,000 dollar Chinese laser engraver/cutter. I’ve had it for almost a year, and I think I can clearly define all it’s shortcomings.
Cutting area is small (8x8in)
Controller software is poor
Laser power control is manual
Poor ventilation for fumes
Poor/no laser cooling system
Not very fast with engraving tasks
Keeping all those things in mind, I’ve decided to start planning a re-build of my laser using...
With the glorious re-launching of my laser, I broke it in with a new design. This is a design meant mostly for small books and is inspired by Gothic Architecture.
This is a design meant mostly for small books and is inspired by Gothic Architecture, inspiration drawn from Cologne Cathedral, and Church of St Barbara Kutna Hora. There are several flying buttress and the "windows" are done in the style of a Flamboyant arch. The small gargoyles are designed after the hunched Notre Dame gargoyles.
Lately I've been doing mostly mechanical projects, there satisfying to build, but usually very time consuming....
After a few weeks of having a broken laser, I received my replacement laser power supply and installed it last night. I emailed a few sellers on eBay that sold similar looking laser engravers with pictures of the fried parts, and I was able to fine someone that happened to have a spare and ships from the US. I was a bit worried about screwing something up, the red power lead you see coming out of the transformer is soldered directly to the laser tube’s terminal. Connecting the new lead was a bit cumbersome with limited space,...
If you are not familiar the Hex Toy is a laser cut building toy, the edge notches fit together to make abstract shapes. Here’s a new version made specifically made for 3mm and 1/8th in plastic. The notches are larger, and the peices themselves are larger too. The feel is much more substantial. Check out the Hex Connectors project page for more detail and to download the new design.
In the past there’s been a lot of talk about laser etched/cut moleskine blank books, but it’s come to attention that the PVC outer layer is very toxic when vaporized. On the other hand, real leather bound journals are great for engraving on and make a great Father’s day gift. This isn’t really a new idea, but it’s great in context of Father’s Day. I chose an image from “Ernst Haeckel: Kunstformen der Natur” It has fantastic and artfully hand drawn illustrations of various plant and sea life, and better yet, is in public domain....
Here are my plans for a 3 stage filter, it has a rough filter, a fine filter, and a tray of activated carbon. It uses standard 14x20in home filters and bathroom ventilation fans for suction. The cost is about $50, not including filters.
It’s good for dust, smoke, and fumes at about 100 CFM. It’s great for my shop.
To start you’ll need:
2 – 24x48x0.5in plywood sheets
1 – 4ft 2x4 board
2 – 8ft 2x2 boards
Screws or nails
2 Bathroom style ventilation fans
...
My last post was about rapid prototyping with sugar and lasers, it turned out well, but the result is really only 2d. Although with some supporting hardware I think it has great potential for making full 3d objects.
Soon I will be testing a 3d object with finer sugar, but the first step is to get all the 2d layers of a 3d object and semi-manually building up the object layer by layer.
After some research I found Skeinforge, a collection of python tools for slicing and creating g-code for 3d printers like the RepRap and Makerbot. I downloaded the version...
I was looking for inexpensive things to engrave at the local department store and came across these cool “Key Tags”. They are a thick paper chip with an aluminum protecting ring around them with a keychain ring already inserted. The Avery 11027 pack has 25 in it for about $3.50. It turns out these are perfect for engraving on and handing out as trinkets, the paper chips mark easily, but are thick enough that a low laser power setting doesn't instantly cut though them. I...
Todbot has posted an excellent tutorial on how to setup and use the minimal Arduino, which is the bare minimum you need to run a ATmega chip and the Arduino bootloader. Todd goes into detail about how to get the bootloader onto the chip as well as how to setup the Arduino environment to use it. Even if your not interested in building an Arduino from scratch, It’s a good read if you are interested in the technical aspects of what makes the Arduino work. http://todbot.com/blog/2009/05/26/minimal-arduino-with-atmega8/
When building the Jansen Walker I coated the feet for better traction, I didn't go into much detail then but I wanted to show the whole process here. Laser cut acrylic parts are pretty slippery, especially on hard surfaces and fabrics. For parts that need good traction, like legs and wheels, it’s nice to have a little extra something. I used plasti-dip, it’s a rubberizing dip that’s designed for dipping tool handles and it works great with laser cut acrylic. I used 3 coats and dried them hanging up, the tricky part is hanging them...
It’s been a while since I’ve posted anything PSCombine related, if you are not familiar here is a short blurb: PSCombine is a program that will import your collection of images or photos and randomly combine them in Photoshop with a random blending, opacity, and filters. I like to think of it as "Computer Assisted Art". It’s free to use, all you need is photoshop, go check out the PSCombine project page for more detail. If you have a PSCombine gallery let me know, I would love to see it. John...
I’m starting on a project that I’ll be using stepping motors and belts, and after looking for cheap parts online, I thought I could do better by stripping down some old scanners.
People are excited to get rid of there old computer stuff, the great thing is it doesn't matter if the old scanner works. Even if it doesn't turn on likely the motor and mechanical parts are still good for salvage. I posted a ad on Portland’s craigslist in the wanted section and got several responses, in a week I had a bunch of scanners for free, I only...
Adam so far has been the first to complete a Jansen Walker and it looks very sharp. This is a build of Beta 2, which includes 3 pairs of legs on each side which looks awesome. He also implements it with a Seguino which is also a first.
It sounds like Adam is still working on one of the servos, but there is a video available at: http://vimeo.com/4739602
Edit: Adam has uploaded a new video with better walking action: http://vimeo.com/4739602
If you have finished a walker, or know someone who has, I would love to hear about it, send me an email.
In other...
Last year while remodeling our house, I took the opportunity to wire up the whole house with cat5e Ethernet wire, as well as coaxial cable to every room, and some lower quality wire for security to each door and window.
Some people think Ethernet is unnecessary with wireless access points and cards being so inexpensive, it’s great to have around, but for permanent (non-mobile) devices I much prefer a wired connection, so I decided to wire the whole house up.
One problem is where to source all the wires to, there ends up being quite a few. A commercial enclosure is big...
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