Tag Archives: screwdriver

Sonic Screwdriver – first draft

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Sonic screwdriver, first draft

Sonic screwdriver, first draft

To the right is a first draft print of my latest designs for the sonic screwdriver.  It’s next to a USB cable for scale and perspective.  There are several things I need to fix:

  • It’s too small.  I was guesstimating the scale based upon the size of hand holding the sonic screwdriver in one of the photos I saw.
  • Too much warpage.  I need to build my heated build platform.  :)  I’ve got my SMT1 soldering Toolkit, now I just need a hotplate.
  • Better connectors.  The connectors I designed are adequate, but not that great.  They need to be much larger to ensure a proper grip between parts.
  • Fix a connector.  I have a hex connector on one piece and a 16-sided connector on another.  That’s not going to work.
  • Consider changing the fit.  Some parts have a 0.25mm clearance on all sides between the male and female connections.  Other parts have a 0.5mm clearance instead.  I tried both on different sections so I could test the fit.  The 0.25mm clearance on all sides is fine for some parts, but other parts could use a little more wiggle room.
  • Change the thickness.  My earlier draft was a whopping 0.5mm thick all around.  I printed these parts at varying thickness to test their durability, flexibility, conserve plastic, and maximize internal space for future electronics.  A 1mm thickness seems to be the most optimal mix.

I’ve posted my sonic screwdriver designs to Thingiverse for people to tinker with and, hopefully, improve.  I would sincerely appreciate any help anyone can provide when it comes to designing the upper half of the sonic screwdriver – especially the moving parts.

  1. surface mount technology [↩]

Real life sonic screwdriver

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This morning I received an e-mail from Bre out of the blue introducing me to Travis Goodspeed.  Apparently Travis has been working on building sonic screwdriver guts out of the GoodFET, a universal JTAG programmer, a “sonic screwdriver of hacking.”  Travis suggested a GoodFET could be programmed to act as a TV-B-Gone, light show, or any number of other things.  Given that his circuit board is about 3″ x 0.85″ x 0.2″1 , there shouldn’t be a problem finding space for it in the sonic screwdriver I’m in the middle of designing. 2

Freaking sweet.

So, here’s my real life sonic screwdriver wishlist:

  • Lights.  Red LED3 , white LED4 , green LED5 , and a UV LED6
  • An actual screwdriver bit or spot where you can attach a screwdriver bit.  It would just be cool to have a sonic screwdriver that could be used as a screwdriver.
  • A shakey Tic-Tac container style recharger.  Having a sonic screwdriver that doesn’t need batteries would be awesome.
  • A tiny speaker that played the sonic screwdriver sound.
  • A tiny magnet.  I remember watching Doctor Who back in the day, black and white old school episodes, where he used his sonic screwdriver to take screws out of things, bolts out of doors, etc in the worst stop motion animation the BBC could get away with.  Still, if this sonic screwdriver had a magnet, it could actually affect a physical change via magnetic force.
  • TV-B-Gone.  On the episode “Midnight” Doctor Who shuts off a bunch of TV’s using his sonic screwdriver.  This would be an INCREDIBLE feature!
  • Flash drive and/or mini-memory card reader.  Perhaps with the entire library from PortableApps.com installed.
  1. For those of you non-imperialists out there: 76.2mm x 21.59mm x 5.08mm [↩]
  2. TBuser, if you want to help, lemme know! [↩]
  3. For night vision.  Also, there are suggestions that a sonic screwdriver can have a “red setting.” [↩]
  4. As a flashlight. [↩]
  5. The 11th Doctor’s screwdriver has a green light. [↩]
  6. For making things fluoresce such as secret messages, blood stains, and monsters. [↩]

Printable Sonic Screwdriver progress

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STL sheet for printable sonic screwdriver

STL sheet for printable sonic screwdriver

Sketch of Screwdriver

Sketch of Screwdriver

Off to the left is a picture of what the finished sonic screwdriver should look like.  Here’s a picture of the parts I’ve designed so far.  Assembled properly, these parts should be able to be assembled into the lower half of the sonic screwdriver.

I’ve arranged the parts so that they have a less than 60mm x 60mm footprint on the build platform.  I would really like it if the final product could be printed all on one build plate and assembled without tools or additional non-printed pieces.

After my recent design-print fail, I’m going back to the drawing board (slightly)1 wiser.  If nothing else, I like to think what I have so far is pretty neat. 2

  1. Make that very slightly. [↩]
  2. Even if it doesn’t work at all. [↩]

New Design: Sonic Screwdriver

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Those of you who are not fans of Doctor Who may want to just skip this post.

In any case, what I’d really like to do is to design and print a life-size model of a sonic screwdriver.  Ideally it would have a spot for inserting an LED, space for a battery, switch, and be able to extend just as the one in the TV show.

Until then, here’s a sonic screwdriver cookie cutter.

Microlathe thoughts

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Cathal Garvey’s Mircolathe is a printable mini lathe made from MakerBot printable parts, ball bearings, a dremmel and other minor parts.

Microlathe by Cathal Garvey

Microlathe by Cathal Garvey

Now, I don’t have a dremmel… but from problems are born solutions.  Everyone has an electric drill, right?  What if the back of the left printable piece had a flathead screwdriver shaped hollow?  You could pop a flathead screwdriver bit into the drill, slide the drill up to the microlathe, put the screwdriver bit into the hollow and turn it on.