At Maker Faire Bay Area this year, Jay from MakerBlock found himself needing to tighten some wingnuts, but he didn’t have a wrench. Rather than asking around, he hacked together a solution on his own. It’s super simple: just one piece of paper. Roll it up into a tight tube and fold it in half. To use, place the paper tube around the wingnut, squeeze, and turn.
In each bi-monthly episode of DiResta (every other Wednesday at 2pm PST), artist and master builder Jimmy DiResta (Dirty Money, Hammered, Against the Grain, Trash for Cash) lets us into his workshop, to look over his shoulder while he builds whatever strikes his fancy. On this episode of DiResta, Jimmy reverse engineers a key to open a vintage lock.
Father’s Day is this Sunday, June 16. If you haven’t gotten anything for your dad yet and you were thinking of just picking up a tie and calling it done, I want to encourage you to rethink that. As a dad, I can say with some authority that dads really don’t really like wearing ties. I mean, it’s a tight knot around your neck. Strange custom. Some of us have to wear them at work, but that doesn’t mean we like them or enjoy getting them as gifts. So instead of something that reminds your dad of work, how about a father’s day gift that appeals to his sense of fun and making? Better yet, how about a gift that will allow you and your pops to make something together? With that in mind we present our 2013 father’s day gift guide. The list contains what we think are practical and enjoyable gifts for dads who like getting their hands dirty and making stuff. Meanwhile, if you’re a dad or make something with your dad this weekend, please document your activities, take some pictures, and send us your story. We’ll follow up with a blog post featuring some the best projects. Send me a note at sholbrook@makermedia.com. Tweet us with #DadMakes or post your project on on Google+.
Imagine someone from Craigslist drops an 800 lb, 13 foot long slab of raw Eucalyptus into your garage. What do you do with it? What can you make with it?
Have some leather scraps taking up room in your craft stash? Make a cute mini leather belt ring!
Motor City’s fourth annual Maker Faire Detroit is taking place next month, on July 27 and 28 at The Henry Ford, and there are still a couple of days left to submit your project and participate as a maker. Maker Faire Detroit is scouting for all kinds of projects, but in particular looking for exhibits […]
German neurobiologist Malte Ahlers (who built a Kinect-equipped humanoid robot), sent us a progress report on his omni wheel robot. What’s especially cool about this project is that Malte really delves into how such a robot works: I didn’t want to just copy some code that I found somewhere on the internet but wanted to […]
