by rjones3 on June 27, 2010
I came across this article on wikipedia, so I decided to make my own. A lot of Inkscape and an order through Ponoko, resulted in the following. I have to make some matching brass hardware to hold the pieces together.
I’m selling a 3.9″ diameter version on Ponoko, with a price point that’s actually very close to Ponoko’s laser cutting cost. I have to play around with their system to see if I can lower the cost. I’m working on custom date ranges. Click here for my Ponoko store.
by rjones3 on December 27, 2009
Google’s Sketchup, which is free (as in beer), is a great tool for sharing concepts and product designs. I decided to rough out a workbench for my apartment using it, and then build it to see how well it integrates in the design process. I had a few ideas what my workbench should be: made out of 2×4′s, have a 4′x2′ top, be about 30″ tall, be built for under $50, and disassemble fairly easily. The size of the top was based on what was easily available and to minimize the cut list, and the height seemed comfortable to me. Build time was about 2 hours working with a circular saw and would have been a great deal faster with a chop saw. Sketchup was nice to use, and a good alternative for this level of project.
This workbench isn’t meant to compete with a mortise and tenon woodworkers bench. This is held together with desk screws and made of pine. It’s good for light duty work. What’s nice about these 2″x4″ workbenches is that they’re so cheap, and easily modified. Need mount a power strip or attach a pegboard? Just get those deck screws out.
Click the link below for design files and bill of materials.
by rjones3 on December 26, 2009
The holiday brings new things into library that I will quickly consume over the course of a month. This book, or should I say compendium, will not be completed in a few years for the fear that I otherwise be accused of hubris. TASCHEN’s “Leonardo da Vinci – The Complete Paintings and Drawings” is a 12 pound, 695 page, 15.4″x10.2″x2.4″ collection of his life’s work. Do not be led to believe that this even begins to scrape the surface of Leonardo’s 13,000 known notebook pages. To my knowledge, there is no single source for all of his works. We are still finding pieces (even underneath other works) after almost 500 years.
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by rjones3 on November 15, 2009
On June 9, 2009, I had the opportunity to experience microgravity aboard NASA’s Microgravity University outreach program. This account follows what the Dusty Plasma Team-II (DPX-II) and I did in our time at the Johnson Space Center and Ellington Field where the flight was from. In addition to microgravity, we had the convenience of “flying” in a hypobaric chamber to 25,000 ft, toured the Neutral Buoyancy Laboratory, and inspected our country’s progress toward the 2019 Moonshot.
I collected thoughts on the experience, some of the neat things I saw, as well as a short discussion of our experiment.
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by rjones3 on November 13, 2009
One of my favorite books to go through when I don’t have time for a big project is the Ashley Book of Knots
(Amazon link) published in 1944 by Clifford W. Ashley. Consider this the grand-daddy of knot tying volumes. It’s definitely a reference for any application that you can possibly think of (it even includes necktie knots). I had some 550 paracord bought from Supply Captain, so I tried my hand at some of the more decorative things. Below is a “Carrick Mat” that serves nicely as a coaster.
