Labs Projects Archive
The Steampunk Roadster
Update: car has been sold! In a few short months The Steampunk Workshop will celebrate it’s 10th birthday! I can barely believe that it’s been ten whole years since this whole “steampunk” thing blew up on the internets. It’s been a lot of fun for me, but I also
A Visual Aid for Bike Design
For Halloween I made a Witch on a broomstick out of 2" thick Styrofoam insulation. I got my 8 year old daughter to pose with a broom and then I snapped a picture with my digital camera. I did an "edge trace" with Paint Shop Pro and used the
Front Wheel Drive Moving Bottom Bracket Experiments
Some random experiments with front wheel drive bikes. Originally published at Bike-Recumbent.com The first iteration is based on Tom Traylor's designs. As with the SWB project I am looking for a bike that I can ultimately try and put in a full fairing. With the short wheelbase bike I
Foundry Furnace – Part 2
I wasn't quite ready to start in with the grinding and welding this past Monday so I thought I'd ease into the day by adapting these photo-copy station lights I found at the dump to my drill press. They sure do make hitting that little automatic punch dimple a
Foundry Furnace – Part 1
This past Monday I finally got started on my foundry project! I’ve been collecting material for some time so I was ready to roll once Maker Faire ’09 concluded. The goal is to built a foundry furnace capable of melting brass and perhape iron, if I’m lucky. I’m
Car Carrier Trailer
If you’ve visited here before you know that one of my long term projects is to built a fully road-able steam powered automobile. In addition to requiring a great deal of research, such a project requires tools. I will need machine tools such as a lathe and a milling
Gas Mask Sawdust Respirator
Update: Sometimes when I'm working in the shop I just need to wear a respirator for a short period. For instance if I just need to walk into the paint area to shoot a second coat on a small part or make a quick cut on the table saw
How to Make a Large Flash Diffuser
Making nice photographs when all you have for lighting is a bunch of tungsten shop lamps can be a real challenge. It is particularly hard to photograph polished brass under these conditions. So this weekend I set out to build a flash diffuser to improve the quality of the photography
How to Make a Cheap Lightbox
For many of my recent projects I have found myself in need of a lightbox so I took a couple of hours from working on my latest project to put together this one. I used a piece of glass from the old Xerox machine that I bought for ten dollars
Thoughts on a DIY Electro-Chemical CNC Machine Tool
There is a class of machine tool know as CNC, or Computer Numerically Controlled. These are computer controlled tools capable of cutting complex shapes with a high degree of accuracy and repeatability. They generally cost tens of thousand of dollars and weigh over a ton. They’re often available used
- 1
- 2