DIY bike repair stand
Sometimes our bikes break, and when they do it’s a lot easier to repair them if you have a stand. Too expensive? Then make you own bicycle repair stand with a few parts form the hardware store.
Bicycles
Making UPC barcodes less boring
I always assumed messing around with your product’s barcode for marketing purposes was, like, a violation of the Geneva Convention or something. Like if you tried to turn your packaging’s boring rectangular barcode into a zebra, or whatever, you’d start to get late-night phone calls from Brussels: “Nice supply chain you have there. Be a shame if something were to, you know, happen to it.” Turns out nobody really cares, so long as it scans
DVD rack built from VHS tapes
From the MAKE Flickr pool Alas, old friend VHS – has it really come to this?! Doomed to spend the rest of your media lifecycle supporting stacks of newfangled digital media. *Sigh* … and how much longer ’til we see those same DVD cases supporting a heap of flash drives/etc? I’ll keep an eye on […]
VR bike ride through Google Street View
Maker Aki Mimoto wrote in to let us know about his exciting new Arduino/VR/Web app mashup. He’s wired up his wife’s bike on a stationary platform to an Arduino using a reed sensor. Using the sensor data from the bike, along with data from a head mounted display (HMD), Ari is able to accurately pinpoint his position within Google Street View.
Layer-additive “welding” 3D fabrication
Electron Beam Free-Form Fabrication (EBF3) is a rapid prototyping technology developed by Karen Taminger of NASA’s Langley Research Center. Dr. Taminger is prone to market EBF3 by analogy to Star Trek style “replicator” technology, which is nothing but shameless hype. Still, the basic idea is an interesting twist on extrusion-based 3D printing technologies (although there’s not really any “extrusion” going on), and is under development with an eye towards space-based fabrication. Working in outer space would eliminate the system’s major ground-based shortcoming, which is the requirement for maintaining a vacuum or inert atmosphere to prevent oxidation of the weld.
The ‘bike tree’, an automatic storage system for cycles, can hold up to 6,000 bikes
The ‘bike tree’, an automatic storage system for cycles, can hold up to 6,000 bikes… watch the video!. David Munk @ THe Guardian.co.uk writes– It’s not often something stops you in your bike tracks. But a spectacular “bike tree” invention from Japan bowled me over when I was in Tokyo a couple of weeks ago. […]
Bicycle handlebar brake lighting
MAKE subscriber Justin Shaw has posted a project on Instructables for a bike brake lighting system that features lights on the ends of a bicycle’s handlebars, controlled by an Arduino and a Pololu 3-axis accelerometer. He’s even offering a $35 prize to the first person who follows his plans and posts proof of a successful […]