We go through a lot of batteries with our projects and gear here at MAKE, luckily, rechargeable batteries are getting really good, better each year. Extremetech has a bit about the new ones from Duracell, they’re pretty close to Alkalines – “The new NiMH batteries will include 2,650 mAh AA cells and 1,000 mAH cells, […]
Justin writes – “Here’s how to build a tensegrity coffee table. I was searching for pvc furniture pipe and luckily stumbled across this site.” – Link. Related: Building Tensegrity Models – Make a “needle tower” sculpture from dowels and elastic cord that seems to defy the laws of physics. MAKE 06 – Page 100.
James Powderly sat down with me and walked me through the process of making throwies. They are easy to make and fun to throw on things. Graffiti Research Labs brought in a bus and they let people make throwies to throw on things. In this video, James explains that throwies are more than little lights […]
Stickman has a pretty spiffy homemade LEGO flash drive – “It uses a 128MB Dick Smith electronics USB flash drive. The casing of the DSE drive was easy to remove and from there it was a matter of resizing the circuit board (it was slightly too large to fit inside a 2×4 Lego brick) by […]
Luke Luck writes – “Here’s a project that uses some of those dead hard drives you’ve got lying around. In the Tesla Turbine, air, steam, oil, or any other fluid is injected at the edge of a series of smooth parallel disks. The fluid spirals inwards and is exhausted through ventilation ports near the center […]
Here’s a pretty good PDF on making your own mini-hydropower plant using (mostly) things you already have around the house – Link.
Plans from 1965 for making a kid sized earth mover – “These plans are for a kid’s sandbox backhoe plans. Half-pint sidewalk superintendents will go ape for this boy-size, rugged, easy-to-build digger. A healthy lad can do wonderful things with a little loose dirt but a boy with his own backhoe is an earth-moving hero. […]
