HOW TO – Make a secondary coil for a Tesla coil
Nak writes – “How to get a nice/free winding station set up for a medium to large sized secondary coil.” – Link. Related: How to make Tesla coils and more – Link.
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HOW TO – Build your own generator
Here’s an oldie, but goodie, make your own generator – “The key to this design is that it will require a horizontal shaft motor, which can be found on old drum style lawnmowers, roto-tillers, and lawn edgers. The most common motor size you will find on the used market will be a 3 or 3.5 […]
HOW TO – Build a plexiglass PC case
Bball writes – “Lots of folks lately are interested in PC case mods with plexiglass windows, fancy 5″ bay gear, interior LED lighting, and custom fan grills. I think it’s great – anything to get away from the blah-PC. I have a number of computers in the house (too many, actually), but I recently spent […]
The creativity machine
Vernor Vinge’s article on Nature.com about virtual worlds – “2020 Computing: The creativity machine. What will emerge from using the Internet as a research tool? The answer, Vernor Vinge argues, will be limited only by our imaginations.” – Link. Pictured here, my avatar at a five-room simulated heart clinic – SLurl.
Liquid Clock
The Water Clock Children’s Museum of Indianapolis displays time as colored & filled up water vessels – “Designed by French physicist and artist Bernard Gitton…The clock, which is 26.5 feet tall, uses 70 gallons of a solution of water, methyl alcohol and food coloring. The alcohol prevents algae and fungus from growing inside the pipes […]
Robots take the field in name of science
Boston Globe has photos and a write up from the FIRST Robotics Competition – “Forty-four high school teams, outfitted in safety goggles and brightly colored T-shirts, were huddled in ”pits,” drilling holes, tightening bolts, and putting the finishing touches on the 5-foot-high robots they’d designed and built. Some looked like shopping carts with circuit boards, […]
Cody’s Robot optical motion sensor
Mac Cody writes – “Since the time that my BTC Mouse Hack was posted on the Make Blog, I’ve developed a printed circuit board using an ADNS-2610 Optical Mouse sensor and hacked an optical enclosure to hold it. The results, while not yet perfect, are very encouraging. The new sensor can be used to measure […]