After a day of setting up for Maker Faire Detroit at The Henry Ford, the MAKE crew visited the i3 Detroit Hackerspace. As we exited our car, we were greeted by Joe Bender and his experimental ham radio antenna, which was clamped onto a wooden coat hanger. He had been working on it outside and was having much success. After a round of introductions, he generously postponed his work to give us on a tour of the hackerspace.
To start things off, we were introduced to this CO2 caster bike, created for the Red Bull Creation challenge last year. It propels itself by contracting the back wheels which freely rotate on both corners. Apparently, kids really loved it at last year’s Maker Faire!
As we moved further to the back, we were shown their latest big tool purchase: a full size CNC mill which they got at a “screaming deal,” according to Joe. It was apparently broken by its previous owner, but members fixed it up and got it running again. It is DOS-based, but luckily, it can run G-Code generated by any CAM software.
To end the tour, three of us played a game that was made for this year’s Red Bull Creation, the Tri-3. It was a 3-person tri-operational game and its objective was to coordinate three pulleys that are attached to a central hub to push all the Red Bull cans into corners of the triangular goals. One person pulls their rope while the other two release at the same rate. A surprise twist is that the hub holding the foam noodles actually rotates when it’s dragged around, making you have to home in on our ninja rope pulling skills. Take a look at that concentration from Rob DeMartin, MAKE’s Business Manager!
Stay tune for a fiery project from an i3 Detroit member!
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