Your Comments

And we’re back with our fifteenth installment of Your Comments. Here are our favorites from the past week, from Make: Online, our Facebook page, and Twitter.

paulbo shared How-To: Build an official BBC Dalek, ca 1973:

We spent a relaxing Saturday a few weeks ago putting together a remote control Dalek using stuff out of our recycling bin (and a “my little pony” radio controlled car). The kids loved it, but the head was a little too flimsy and didn’t survive them playing with it on the swings… (I don’t think they understood that ‘rovey’ was supposed to be out conquering the galaxy, not playing on swings).

David did some measurements of the Jet Ponies ride that Tim O’Reilly took for a spin at Maker Faire:

I’m seriously impressed – both by the ride and the fortitude of those who tried it! I froze a frame and placed lines over a screenshot to measure the angle between the ride’s hanger arms and the horizontal. Averaged just about 20°. If my ancient and rusty trig serves me correctly, they’re polling almost exactly 3 G’s! I hope the structure was engineered for the stress, but it sure looks like fun…

philliposophy had some suggestions to improve the Heat gun and thermos coffee roaster concept:

It’s a good idea to heat and then cool the coffee as fast as possible. 1:50 is obviously way too long, but this was probably shown as a proof of concept: from green to charcoal in a minute 50. The thermos idea is great for heating quickly, but the cooling cycle should not take place in the same vessel. What cools hot coffee down _really_ fast is a few metal pans that’ve been in the freezer for a while. Done right, this person’s set up could be amazing.

J. Trent Adams noticed an essential feature of Mark’s sweet workshop:

I see that you have a human skull on your shelf. Now I know you’re an official mad scientist.

We thought the idea behind the Homemade power strip was interesting, however commenters were quick to point out some flaws in the design. For instance, Jeff was concerned about strain relief on the cable connectors:

The OP has used cable connectors that aren’t designed to be used with non-metallic sheathed cable (NM), or romex. The screw will wear through the outer sheath and insulation on the romex, creating conditions for an electrical fault. By all means, folks, MAKE stuff… but do it safely and correctly, particularly if you’re going to post it for general consumption.

The author of the project, Chris K, responded to explain the situation:

Rather than reply one-by-one since there are a few here: Yes, I used the wrong cable connectors and re-did the whole thing with the right ones – but didn’t re-take the pictures. Definitely my bad. I know one shouldn’t use romex where it flexes at all, but this is a case where I knew it wouldn’t be moving – if it was I’d have just used a cheap power strip. The reason for not using a power strip in the first place – I wanted a more convenient switch for turning everything off and more spacing for convenience. For the plugs – when attaching it, I either lose one of the screws that you have to take all the way out to attach things, or the cheap plastic wasn’t put together right in the first place – If I end up with a good one, it’s fine, but they’re often so cheap (read:disposably cheap) that they weren’t right to start with. All that said, I’ll do better next time with the suggestions here, promise.

Over on Facebook, Jay Bryon was pleased to have contributed the Robotic swarm over Switzerland:

My second or third submission to the make blog. This one has it all: Drone flying wings, Linux, reverse engineered evolved path solutions, all combined to create a robotic swarm.
There is nothing I don’t like about this project.

Also on Facebook, Neil Prestemon has a good point about the Visual 6502 simulator:

Finally. A pragmatic use for javascript. I may allow one exception on my NoScript whitelist now.

On twitter, Kathy Mancall enjoyed the Attack of the Cardboard Robots:

Awesome! Now if only they could knit! RT @make: Attack of the cardboard robots: http://cot.ag/dDcIkM

Like these comments? Be sure to sound off in the comments! You could be in next week’s column.