Category: Making

  • Parabolic Reflector Base for Lichtenberg Figure

    Parabolic Reflector Base for Lichtenberg Figure

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    I have a cylindrical acrylic Lichtenberg figure I have been displaying for several years on a turned cherry base I made…and never liked. I decided to improve the situation by building a system for more uniform illumination of the entire column. You can find the major files for this design at Thingiverse:5508486. My design uses…

  • 3D Printed Theodolite and Survey for Stellarium

    3D Printed Theodolite and Survey for Stellarium

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    For years I’ve wanted a theodolite but even used they are not particularly affordable. To support planning sky viewing a wanted to be able to survey the obscuration from buildings and trees in my front and back yards. Thingiverse offered the answer–a printable 1 degree resolution theodolite. I ended up remixing it and you can…

  • Pi Weather Station with InkyWHAT Health

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    I made a thing. This thing is–neh, this ensemble of things–is a Raspberry Pi 3 server with attached local sensors and an attached local eInk display. Furthermore this Pi uses an RTL SDR to collect information from my outside sensors and my neighbors’ weather stations. This post is about only the server’s mechanical structure. The…

  • Better Filament Dryer

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    The previous dryer only achieved a peak temperature of about 47C, which is much lower than the recommended 80C from 3devo. I made two upgrades: Wrapped the bucket in a moving blanket for insulation, and then because I was concerned about overheating, Connected a PID controller. I did not seriously try to run this at…

  • 3D Printer Filament Dryer

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    I built a filament dehydrator following the basic plan on Taulman3D’s site, which I expect to need for both PETG and nylon prints. PLA prints have never been a problem for me here in the high desert. Taulman3D suggests using a 40 W or 60 W lightbulb as the heat source, and that the 40…

  • Hexagonal Blanket Dimensions

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    Look at the right-most figure in diagram. The small triangle defines the all the major dimensions of the hexagon. Assuming the user measures the edge-to-edge dimension $c$, he or she can calculate the rest of the measurements. A simple right-triangle expression gives the relationship between $s/2$ and $c/2$, and is readily solved for $s$ in…

  • Container Gardening

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    Container gardening is ideal for the small suburban backyard without much space. It is even better suited to the arid climate because the required water is much less—in my system I water less than twice a week and use less than a gallon. I’m using a container gardening system worked out by others, and it…

  • 3D Printing the Mountains

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    Hanging on the wall, under the low ceiling in the basement of my childhood home was a map. It was plastic, and it had a 3D texture of the Colorado Rocky Mountains. Flying over the range in my imagination I could see the high mountain valleys bowled in by the snowcapped peaks. As an adult…

  • My Daughter’s Nightstand

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    This week I finished a cabinet carpentry project started after Thanksgiving in 2014. It was a stretch of my skills, the first time building a project with full panel construction, where all the panels were solid wood. Except for the bottom of the drawer, the entire structure is made of solid wood. To control cost,…

  • 3D-Printer and Your Coffee Grinder

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    Two weeks ago I acquired a 3D printer; specifically the Printrbot Simple Metal Kit and, after some warranty help, it’s printing well. The first thing I printed was the fan shroud for the 3D printer itself, as recommended by Printrbot, but the next things were for my own design. I printed a set of three…