Workshop

The latest DIY ideas, techniques and tools for the industrial arts from metal and woodworking to CNC machining and 3D printing.

Herringbone Gear Can Crusher

A reduction gear train made of pine plywood sheathing scraps laminated together with screws and powered by a 3/4 h.p. electric motor. Herringbone or Chevron gears are stronger than spur gears and do not have any tendency to move along the axle even under heavy loads. There are no bearings other than the center hole […]

Meet the Makers: Maurice Connolly

Meet the Makers: Maurice Connolly

Maurice Connolly built a 300 lb steel sculpture and dropped it off a cliff. He pitted his art against gravity, just to see what would happen. The piece is a massive sphere called Ganymede- constructed from recycled wine barrel hoops and hundreds and hundreds of bolts. Once Maurice mastered the material and perfected the form, he turned his curiosity towards force, motion, and the nature of unpredictability.

Maurice’s freshly distorted sphere will be at Maker Faire Bay Area, May 21 & 22. You can meet him and ask about tensile strength, conical strips of steel, and what it feels like to drop your art off a cliff.

Pat Delany’s Designs for Low-Cost DIY Machine Tools

Pat Delany’s Designs for Low-Cost DIY Machine Tools

We have covered septuagenarian Palestine, TX, resident Pat Delany’s DIY multimachine, which is mostly built from recycled auto parts, before. Following on the success of that design, Pat has branched out, researching and promulgating three more simple build-it-yourself tool designs: A treadle-powered electrical generator, a simple compound lever drill press, and—most interesting to me—a lathe made from cast concrete and aligned with wedges sawn flush after the concrete has set up. Engineering for Change has a good overview of the story and the available online resources. [Thanks, Jake!]

Stirling Engine Generates 1 Watt

Doug Conner‘s Stirling engine may be viewed at the upcoming Bay Are Maker Faire. Check it! This Stirling engine delivers 1W to a stepper motor used as generator to power a high-power LED. This engine uses electrical heating for simplicity and to simplify efficiency measurements. At 1.7% efficiency, it’s not a good way to power […]