my latest pen design. Since skulls are so popular I thought I would experiment with this.
this is a 3d raised body pen with raised skulls on a cocobolo blank.
They are rotary turned on my home CNC since we don’t have a rotary fixture for any of the DMS CNCs. So it’s just presented here for design posibilities.
cheers!
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I’ve been working on a 3d printed P-47 Thunderbolt, printed from PETG. It’s all single layer walls, no infill and hollow inside aside from some structural ribs. The fuselage is done, I’m now working on the wing. When complete, it will have a 48" wingspan. It has ailerons, rudder, elevator, and retracts.
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XCSoar is pretty purpose-built for a few different flying communities… what are you going to do with it?
I plan to use it for horseback riding: a large daylight-readable map is useful. Since XCSoar is FOSS, I might tweak it to be a little more non-flyer friendly, mostly by suppressing the MANY options for racing, waypoints, wind, terrain collision, et al which don’t really apply to ground travelers.
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If you get into some XCSoar hacking, I would be very interested to talk about the experience.
With much help from @wandrson, I made an indexing plate for my Taig micro lathe, an indexing pin, and a block that holds the indexing pin. This involved the Bridgeport (and the dividing head - which was a great learning experience), the metal band saw, the lathe, some taps and of course the parts washer (which was also new for me).
Here the Bridgeport is drilling the outer circle of indexing holes in 1/8" 5052 aluminum (which is coated with blue DyeKem). And I have to say … LOVE, LOVE, LOVE that power drawbar! No more ladder for me! 
When I assembled it, much to my dismay (but sadly, not to my surprise) my tolerancing was a bit off. The index pin that mates with the holes in the disk didn’t align quite right. However, after wallowing out the hole in the mounting block with a bit 0.005" larger - voilà! It works.
Now I just need a filing attachment to go with it.
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With some artwork from the designers at the office and new laser cutter training at hand we took to learning in detail how to get use out of the thunder laser. We made a sign for the office, some dashed line cardboard signs that my wife painted, and a slotted structure body for a Mike wazowski (monster’s inc) halloween costume.
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So using the tutorial I posted here: How to Use the Gocupi in the Hallway and some help of @Ed_Krohne figuring out how to use Curves instead of Levels in GIMP to change the light and dark contrast. I was able to draw this incredibly detailed @JohnK head (I’m sure he’ll love finding this since I didn’t ask his permission).
Also if you go to my M:\MitchC\GocupiConverter\ there’s a GIMP Portable so you can run GIMP without needing admin rights on the space computers.
A huge thanks to @Perpetual for the webserver and interface, it has made the Gocupi 100x more accessible for anyone to use it.
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I very much enjoy the added visual effect of extra long stray hairs coming out of Johns beard.
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Hey, any picture on the Wiki member page is fair game IMO. Impressionist John K, Monet would be proud.
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Since I joined, there has been a steady decline in the number of random @JohnK heads around the 'space. Thanks for helping restore it to it’s original ‘surprise @JohnK head around every corner’ glory
: )
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Relocated to a new work location and found the lighting over my desk unsatisfactory. Knowing I had most of the bits needed to make a LED lamp, I set to work hacking it into existence using…
- LED strip (4000K 3528 high density) 24", 2
- Aluminum extrusion, 24" (9/16 x 11/16 x 1/16 U channel I believe)
- Flexible dry-erase board
- More aluminum extrusion for the support (some custom piece I got for free destined for greater use, however its purpose evades me)
- 2.1mm right-angle leads, 2
- 2.1mm bulkhead jacks, 3
- 12V DC / 1A power supply
- SPDT toggle switch (only need a SPST but for some masochistic reason I wanted to break both the positive and negative)
- 18ga stranded hookup wire
- Copious amounts of heat shrink
… Off …
… On …
In context.
For a project that took about perhaps 72 hours from conception to completion, I’m fairly satisfied. It lights up the left side of my desk to a satisfactory degree. I could have executed a little cleaner - shorter leads from the LED bar, cleaner cuts on the reflectors/diffusers, shorter overall reflectors/diffusers. Oh, and I probably should have tested the reflectors/diffusers first since my assumption was they’d reflect more and diffuse less.
I think I spent more time drilling out the 1/2" - half inch! - holes in the support bracket than anything else since Tanner’s did not have more … diminutive … bulkhead mount 2.1mm jacks.
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Making pillows using videogame 8bit artwork from all of the flannel strips I’ve been cutting. The first fully assembled panel:
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Most of this construction has been in my home lab, but I did do some work at DMS, so I think it counts.
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The auxiliary input on the radio in my truck was damaged. It had very little solder on the joints and the jack ripped off the circuit board. There, I fixed it! Didn’t even have to whip out the duct tape.
The radio unit itself had a bunch of these crazy tiny bolts with traditional hex heads. I used some small needle nose pliers because a 5mm driver was waaaaay too big for them. That was 90% of the time it took to make the repair.
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That is very awesome! What map formats does it use?
Sample piece for the Jeweling metals class I’m doing this Saturday. An easy decoration for a knife blade.
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