Category Archives: MakerBlock

All things MakerBlock: RepRap, MakerBot, Cupcake CNC, open source, and plastic building toys!

Maker Faire Application: Vacuum Forming Workshop

Posted on by
DIY Vacuum Formed Arc Reactors

DIY Vacuum Formed Arc Reactors

I’ve been making some notes as I work on my vacuum former and the proposed workshop for this year’s Bay Area Maker Faire.  Here’s some ideas and thoughts, in no particular order.12

  • Workshop Proposal
    • I’ve demonstrated my bucket vacuum former at my daughter’s school a few times – and it is always a huge hit.  The vacuum formed result looks like so much more than the product of very cheap and accessible materials.  Two years ago I put on a presentation at Maker Faire about how to build a vacuum former – and this year I want to try something even more ambitious.  Here’s the slideshow from 2017.

    • I want to do an entire workshop on how to build and operate a vacuum former – and then let people try to vacuum form their own objects.  One of my favorite things to vacuum form is an “Arc Reactor” and then augment it with an RGB flashing LED and a coin cell battery.  However, I think people would also enjoy making goggles and phone cases.  It takes about 30 seconds to heat up the plastic and just seconds to actually vacuum form a shape and let it cool down.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

  • New Developments
    • Several months ago, just before Thanksgiving, our stovetop stopped working.  Yeah.  I know.  Talk about timing, right?  While we scrambled to get a new cooktop ordered, delivered, and installed, we also purchased an inexpensive hot plate from Amazon.  I had originally used an old hand-me-down large toaster oven to heat up the plastic, but wondered … is there a better way?  That toaster oven is huge and takes a long time to heat up.  This weekend I was delighted to learn the hot plate heats up very quickly, gets hot enough to soften the plastic, and works as a fantastic and compact replacement for the toaster oven.
      • There are a few caveats to using the hot plate.
        • The heat was more localized, causing the center of the plastic to become thinner and saggier.  When the plastic plates were heated in the toaster oven, they tended to heat more evenly.  Perhaps if I tried a lower heat setting or held the plastic plate higher, this might be mitigated.
        • It’s hard to get a sense of the plastic without actually watching it get soft and wobbly.  This is especially true when the plate is inside the toaster oven – there’s only room enough for one or two people to see what’s going on.  However, with the hot plate, there’s no enclosure3 to obscure an audience view.
        • I was somewhat paranoid about letting the plastic droop down onto the heating element.  I’m pretty sure it would smelled horrible, made a huge mess, been nearly impossible to clean, and made the hot plate unsuitable for any other purposes.  I may try to locate a cheap hot plate from a second hand / thrift store / goodwill to take to Maker Faire.  Though, now I’m also wondering if it might be possible to repurpose an old coffee maker, grill, griddle, or panini press, into the heater for this project.  Maybe if I covered the heating element in aluminum foil first, that would protect the surface?
      • The power switch of the vacuum head / bucket head is conveniently placed right on top for normal operation.  For unusual operations such as this, where the vacuum is upside down, it is decidedly inconvenient.  I used a power strip with a switch which made it much easier to operate the vacuum.  I think I may invest in a dedicated foot switch extension cord for this project.  It’s a very cheap upgrade that would make it a lot easier to do.
    • I also have a prior post discussing some additional ideas on how to improve this process.
  • Accessories / Things to Bring to Maker Faire.  There are SO many little parts to a project – forget any one little thing and you’re going to be making a last minute trip to the hardware store.4 Here’s a few lists of things I will need:
    • Parts
      • Bucket
      • Vacuum head
      • Hot plate
      • Power strip or foot switch extension cord
      • One or two wire coat hangers
      • 6x Small to medium binder clips
      • Wooden dowel (1x 6″ riser, 3x 8″ legs)
      • 3D printed parts (1x plug, 2x riser caps, 3x leg holders, 3x feet)
      • Hot glue
    • Building Tools
      • Drill (for drilling holes)
      • Ruler and / or paper grid
      • Chisels
      • Hacksaw (cutting the wooden dowels)
      • Hot glue gun
      • Sharpie
    • Presentation Tools
      • Heat gun
      • Scissors (cutting plastic plates)
      • Old socks (DIY oven mitts)
    • Materials
      • Examples of plastic plates in various stages of the process
      • Examples of items made, also in various stages of production
    • Consumables
      • Plastic plates
      • Tape (clear packing tape works well)
      • Fishing line
      • Elastic cord
      • Pens (metallic permanent markers)
      • LED’s
      • Batteries
      • Maybe stickers to give away?
Bucket Vacuum Former
  1. How to Make a Vacuum Former
  2. How to Use a Vacuum Former
  3. Vacuum Former – Things to Form
  4. Vacuum Former – Ideas to Improve Vacuum Former
  5. Maker Faire 2017 How to Make a Vacuum Former Presentation Slides
  6. Vacuum Forming an Arc Reactor
  7. Maker Faire Application: Vacuum Forming Workshop
  1. As always, as much to inform you, dear reader, as to order my own thinking and jot things down before I forget them [↩]
  2. DOCUMENT!!! [↩]
  3. And, now that I think of it, it may be the enclosure which causes more even heating… [↩]
  4. Not that this is a bad thing.  But, I’d rather have to go because I want to do go [↩]

Rocklin Mini Maker Faire 2018

Posted on by
15 Second Drawings
15 Second Drawings

My daughter, TinkerGirl, and I are going to be demonstrating our 15 second drawings at the Rocklin Mini Maker Faire this Saturday.  We’re pretty stoked about this since it will be our first time as Makers at this Mini Maker Faire.  We’ll be the ones wandering around with a DIY dry erase board.

If you’re wondering what the heck “15 second drawings” even means… it’s just what it sounds like.  Both of us will each draw whatever you want in 15 seconds.  Whatever you want, no matter how complicated or absurd, drawing before your eyes in just 15 seconds.

Or, we can teach you how to draw anything in 15 seconds.  Or compete against us or perhaps challenge a friend (or enemy?!) to a 15 second drawing.

You want to learn more?!

Loudest 3D Printed Whistle – now with 100% more science

Posted on by

Extremely loud and compact emergency whistle v1

Extremely loud and compact emergency whistle v1

I ordered a decibel meter from Amazon the other day so I could drop some science on the claims from various 3D printed whistles on Thingiverse.  There are several that claim to be the loudest.  Well, today, I began my quest to put these claims to rest.

The closer the decibel meter is to a sound source, the higher it registers.  To eliminate some of these variables, I placed the decibel meter on a counter in front of me and a chair 24 inches in front of that.  For each of the whistles I was testing I stood just behind the chair and gave the whistle three hearty puffs.  The decibel meter, which was set to record and display the “max” reading, would then tell me the loudest reading for that set of three whistle toots.

Without further ado, I declare the “Extremely loud and compact emergency whistle” by Whistleblower on Thingiverse the clear winner at 121.1 decibels.  Both whistles by this designer took the top two scientifically determined spots.

NameThingiverse IDMass (grams)PricePrint Time (minutes)DecibelsSubjective Rank
Extremely loud and compact emergency whistle [v1]29330213.9$0.1222121.11
Extremely loud and compact emergency whistle [v2]29330213.7$0.1118111.53
v29 (Over 118 db!)117916013.9$0.4290110.44
2 chamber whistle (LOUD) [w5]26165128.1$0.2449109.52
Emergency Whistle with Solidworks 2014 source4951721.2$0.047101.85
Whistle Ring Modified [v2]20271151.6$0.05990.86

Just how loud is 121.1 decibels? 1  Well, for starters, it’s just above the pain threshold of 120 decibels.  It’s louder than:

  • Your iPod headphones at maximum volume
  • A baby crying, next to your ear
  • A full symphony orchestra
  • The subway
  • A sporting event
  • A chainsaw
  • A jetski
  • A marching band

It’s on par with:

  • Thunder
  • A shotgun
  • An ambulance siren
  • A rock concert

And, if you didn’t have earplugs, you would exceed the daily safe exposure limit for 121 decibels in 7 seconds.

There may be louder whistle on Thingiverse2 and, if so, please let me know.  I’ll print the model and test against the others in my arsenal.

Default Series Title

  1. This page has several charts to help explain. [↩]
  2. Or some other online 3D design repository [↩]

Loud 3D Printed Whistle Test, Take 2

Posted on by

Impatient for my decibel meter to arrive from Amazon and eager to get more feedback on the loudest 3D printed whistle, I brought the four loudest whistles to work and enlisted the help of two friends.  We performed the test much the same as the last time – only this time they were on one end of a large parking lot and I had driven to the far side to blow each whistle once, then repeated them each once.  Here’s the result on their subjective test:

NameThingiverse IDMass (grams)PricePrint Time (minutes)RankDecibels
Extremely loud and compact emergency whistle [v2]29330213.7$0.11181TBD
Extremely loud and compact emergency whistle [v1]29330213.9$0.12222TBD
2 chamber whistle (LOUD) [w5]26165128.1$0.24493TBD
v29 (Over 118 db!)117916013.9$0.42904TBD

Whether the1 loudest whistle is the v1 or v2 of the “Extremely loud and compact emergency whistle,” Thingiverse user whistleblower clearly designed an amazing, quick printing, low cost whistle.  It has a very high pitched piercing tone that can be downright painful to be near, let alone create. 2

As before there’s a number of different things that could be happening here.  Perhaps the particular tone of this whistle travels better through open spaces (such as a parking lot) rather than through a door and down a hall (such as inside my house).  I know there are some whistles that require a lot of blowing power to hit maximum volume and others which almost “choke” on too much pressure.

In two days my decibel meter will arrive and I’ll try all of these tests again and post a new table.  If you think you’ve got a contender or have seen a really loud whistle on Thingiverse, let me know in the comments so I can print and test it.

Default Series Title

  1. Subjectively [↩]
  2. Again, I had my earplugs in for the test [↩]

Maker Faire 2018 – 3D Printing for Home Improvement

Posted on by

If you’re here checking out my site after my presentation, you can check out all the slides from my presentation above. If you’d like more information about the individual things in the slides, I posted an update for most of them over on Hackaday. If you’ve still got some questions, feel free to leave a comment below, hit me up on twitter, email me directly.

SOLVED! I can’t upload Arduino sketch to Wemos D1 Mini ESP8266

Posted on by

ESP8266 Wemos D1 Mini pinout

ESP8266 Wemos D1 Mini pinout

My Wemos D1 Mini WiFi boards had arrived from China1 on Friday and I’ve been fiending to build… something with them.

Unfortunately, I couldn’t get the very basic “blink” sketch to upload.  Here were my symptoms:

  • When uploading, I got the “error: failed to open” message
  • My Windows computer flashed a message when I connected the board, saying it was an unrecognized device
  • The Device Manager showed a little “alert triangle” suggesting the proper drivers were not installed
  • All of the ports in the Arduino IDE were disabled and greyed out

I tried several different upload speeds and several different USB micro cables to no success.  It was not until I found this post explaining that I needed to update the Wemos drivers along with a handy link to said drivers.

Now that I got this board blinking, I can’t wait to get it to do MOAR…

Default Series Title

Update:  My buddy Chris pointed out that I’ve been mixing up ESP32 and ESP8266.  I’ve corrected the title now.

  1. $13 for four boards plus headers?! [↩]

Bamboo Illuminated Dome

Posted on by

Pieces for a Bamboo Illuminated Dome

Pieces for a Bamboo Illuminated Dome

I’ve always liked the idea of geodesic domes, but haven’t had the space, time, or ability to actually assemble one.  On top of all that, I was having trouble coming up with an idea for struts that would be both sturdy and cheap enough to build a dome at a reasonable cost.

Until I went to the grocery store recently.  The local supermarket had a clearance table with long bamboo skewers.  I realized these could probably work really well as struts and they were extremely cheap to boot.  I bought a few a the store to try out, but ultimately turned to Amazon for my bulk bamboo purchase.

I’ve already designed the connectors to work with these bamboo skewers.  You can try them out here on Thingiverse.

Once I’ve got the skewers cut to size and the remaining connectors printed, I’ll be wrapping the entire structure in that stretchy plastic wrap used for protecting furniture when you are moving. 1  Then I’ll be putting some LED’s and possibly a laser inside to make it more interesting.  :)

Lasers.

Default Series Title

  1. We have two rolls left over from the last two times we moved… [↩]

Practical 3D Printing for Everyone

Posted on by

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

3D printing can sometimes get a bad rap.  At first people are excited by the possibilities, then after printing a few trinkets the novelty can really start to wear off.  However, our 3D printers have become an absolutely critical part of our home repairs.

We have printed literally dozens and dozens of things in and around our home.  As of the time I’m editing this post, we’re up to 82 things so far!  The vast majority of these are completely bespoke custom creations, with a few things that are printed from Thingiverse or mashups with things from Thingiverse.

My proposed Maker Faire Bay Area 2018 Presentation submission is for a presentation that discusses:

  1. Practical things everyone can 3D print for their own home
    1. Repairs
    2. Improvements
    3. Other useful things
  2. 3D Printing with Family and Friends
    1. Specifying a purpose (“Honey, can you make me something that…”)
    2. Specifying dimensions and purpose (“I need something that will…”)
    3. Simple techniques for creating replacement parts (using good reference photos, GIMP, Inkscape, and OpenSCAD)
  3. 3D Design with Family and Friends
    1. Photographs
    2. Sketches
    3. TinkerCAD and Sketchup

Default Series Title

ESP WiFi Board Experiments

Posted on by

A friend of mine pointed me in the direction of some ESP32 board tutorials over at MsRaynsford.co.uk.1 You know it’s a fast moving area when a post that’s less than a month old already has a dead link.  :)  Rather than re-creating all the tutorials that are already out there, I’m going to just jot down my notes and links as a short of “quick start guide to quick start guides.”

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

  1. ESP Boards
    1. There’s several different “flavors” of ESP WiFi tech, however it seems as if they all break down into one of three different categories.
      1. Bare ESP WiFi module.  These require a bit of effort to make work since the bare module requires the pins to be broken out to be made useful.
      2. ESP WiFi breakout boards.  This type of board, which has 8 pins broken out, requires a programmer.  Since these 8 pins are arranged in a 2×4 pattern, they can’t be used directly in a breadboard.
      3. ESP WiFi development boards.  These board seem to have lots of pins broken out and typically a USB connector.  Since these boards have more features (voltage regulators, compatibility with other boards’ form factors, USB communication built-in), they’re going to be more expensive.  There’s the Adafruit Huzzah, the Sparkfun ESP Thing, and then something called the ESP Wemos D1.
    2. There are several different ESP modules and boards which have varying amounts of space from 512kb to 4MB and varying amounts of pins from 2 to 24 pins.  These modules all tend to have different names (ESP-01, ESP-07, etc, etc) but are all known as ESP8266.
    3. The ESP modules require 3.3v, so a 5.0v USB or other source will fry them.  Plan accordingly.  Some development boards have voltage regulators on them to adjust the power going to the module.
  2. Correct Board Manager URL for ESP boards
  3. An overwhelming amount of information for ESP boards
  4. Ordering Boards
    1. I’m ordering several boards off of Aliexpress.  I’m getting a few Wemos D1 boards, since they’ll be easy to prototype with2 , and a few ESP-01 breakout boards and a single programmer to toss into a project.  Then again, at <$3 a piece for the Wemos boards and <$2 a piece for the ESP breakouts, it doesn’t make a ton of sense to stretch to put the ESP-01’s into a project.  My thinking is that most any project I build will only use a pin or two and not be too terribly complicated anyhow, so that once it’s been prototyped I can just burn it into the ESP-01’s and permanently install it into a project.
    2. I’m not exactly sure which what WiFi enabled things I’d like to build yet. 3  Here are some ideas:
      1. A pair of tap lights that are connected over the internet.  I’d tap one before I left work, it would flash a color to let me know it sent a message, and the other one at home would light up to let my fam know I was on the way.  I guess it’s similar in theory to this.
      2. A button to call an Uber or Lyft.
      3. A button that will email or call my cell in 2-5 minutes from the time I press the button.  Useful when I know someone who stepped into my office isn’t good at taking a hint.  Or when I need to get off a conference call.
      4. A button that can be used to log simple events.  Might be useful at work in a variety of ways.
      5. A button that will automatically start a print job on my WiFi enabled 3D printer.

Default Series Title

  1. Another tutorial here and here [↩]
  2. Solder in headers, connect via USB, drop in breadboard, prototype away [↩]
  3. Sometimes I will buy a few parts I know will be useful, spend some time tinkering with them, and then later build something when inspiration strikes. [↩]