This week on Maker Update: New Chrome Available,
A print a day keeps the laser cutter away,
Homebrew cable and a farewell to calibration cubes.
Hello and welcome back to Maker Update,
the show where we keep you up to date
on all the cool things that makers are making.
I'm Tyler Winegarner and I hope you're all doing great.
We've got a pretty packed show for you, so let's not keep you waiting,
and let's check out that project of the week.
I've got to admit I have a bit of a soft spot for all things cyberpunk,
but despite that, I just have to admit how impressed I am with this glowing, retractable,
mantis blade cosplay piece by Zibartas.
The tricky thing with this kind of cosplay piece is for it to be lore-accurate.
The whole thing needs to collapse down into his forearm.
Zibartas still seems pretty attached to his meat arms, so that's just not going to work.
which is why he opted to create
these specific ones that don't fully retract into the arm.
So instead he could build these 3D printed sleeves
to form the base of the structure.
He used 3D scanning to get a reliable model of his arm
and even planned his build around some of the design considerations
of the fictitious manufacturer, making sure to keep any amount of exposed
wiring to a minimum for a sleek, minimalist design.
For the animatronics, he's using a pair of heavy duty servos,
one close to his wrist and another at the elbow, which allows the blade to extend
and retract in a manner similar to the arms of a praying mantis.
The glowing blade is achieved using some edge led acrylic,
but he's tapered it down by sanding, not just to make sure it glows fiercely,
but also to reduce the weight so the service don't have to work as hard.
The animation is controlled by pressure sensors in his hands.
The servos are driven by an Arduino Nano and everything is powered
by a small portable battery held in a waist harness on his back.
Ideal for keeping all the non-visual elements out of sight.
And the final reveal is fantastic.
Really looking the part of a cybernetic weapon from the dark future.
This is the same person who created that fantastic cosplay from overwatch that
we covered last year.
And I'll be looking forward to seeing more of his builds in the future.
More projects!
Over on his blog, Pete Prodoehl finally detailed his process
of how he made over 40 ink prints in the month of January.
To make the plates,
he used a 3D printer to create the relief plates at a height of three millimeters
that heights is derivative of his old process of making plates on a laser cutter
using three millimeter baltic birch.
But at that print height, it means the prints don't take
too long to come off the printer.
To get a smoother printing surface,
He's making use of the ironing feature that's available in a number of slicers
and finishing it with a tiny bit of sanding.
The press he's using is from a DIY kit called the Provisional Press.
If you want to make your own, they're no longer selling the kits,
but they have laser cutter plans
If you want to build one from the ground up.
Over on the Adafruit blog,
I learned about this pocket sized cyber deck by Michael Klements.
The element that makes this whole thing possible is the Hyperpixel display by Pimoroni,
which is a four inch touchscreen display
that mounts directly to the Pi and is driven by the GPIO pins.
The other half of this interface is this tiny keyboard
It looks like a repurposed BlackBerry keyboard, and it kind of is.
But this one comes from a Tindie project that added a PCB that turns it
into a USB device and also provides a pinout for an I2C interface.
You even get that little BlackBerry trackpad.
Most of the rest of the video is how he created the laser cut enclosure.
But still, that's a ton of really useful hardware
packed into this video that you can use for your next project.
And from Clabretro, we have this home lab cable setup.
Some folks set up their own plex servers, but he's building his own custom
But he’s building his own
cable broadcasting system that he can use in his own home.
A lot of the video is troubleshooting and repairing old broadcast studio equipment.
Supplying the video signal into the modulator is a Raspberry Pi,
serving composite video via the TRRS jack.
It's a fun dive into some pretty retro tech that I never knew about.
Check it out.
Time for some tips and tools,
Stefan from CNC Kitchen wants you to stop printing calibration cubes.
He starts out by explaining why he thinks the standard 20 millimeter calibrationcube is bad,
and might actually be making things worse for your printer’s accuracy.
Over extrusion, elephant’s foot, a skewed gantry,
and even the relatively small size of the cube can add up to big problems
when trying to get proper dimensions for larger prints.
His solution might be a little frustrating for some folks:
It involves a paid print by Vector3D called the Califlower.
The good news is it's only €5.
This is a much larger print that not only allows you to understand
your printer's calibration over a larger print area,
but it also has measuring for internal and external dimensions.
The calibration process is a little bit more fiddly
and it requires referencing a spreadsheet, but should yield better results overall.
Over on Printables,
they just wrapped up a lightning round contest on soldering solutions.
Thermoplastics don't seem like a match made in heaven for soldering temps,
but there's a massive range of great ideas here.
Like PCB clamps, this solder paste and flux dispenser
heat shrink tube organizers,
fume extractors, part clamps and tons more.
Through the Makezine blog, I learned about another set of tools
in Blender that can be used for CAD: Geometry Nodes.l
Geometry Nodes are a relatively new set of tools in Blender that let you create node-based
programmatic modules for procedural geometry.
They can be used for creating anything from sprinkles on donuts
to weird and surreal shapes like this.
Joe Bowers has a few videos on TikTok on how,
with the right parameters they can also be used to create easily
configurable CAD designs for all manner of desk organizers,
cable brackets, and pretty much whatever else you can think of.
Amazing stuff.
And finally, over on his channel, Zack Freedman of Void Star Labs
made a video that's more or less a tribute to the late Sanjay Mortimer.
If you're like me and you aren't that familiar with Sanjay's work, but you own a printer
that's more or less based on any of the modern RepRap printer designs,
You should probably give this video a watch.
Not just because the legacy of his work
helps your prints pop off the plate successfully,
But there's also a great mention at the end about the importance
of being enthusiastic about your own projects as well as others
and enthusiastically sharing them.
It just makes the world a better place.
For this week's Digi-Key spotlight, we're checking out their latest video
on picking the right wireless tech for your project.
With today's DIY technology stack, you're really spoiled for choice:
Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, Lora, Cellular,
But what are the benefits and tradeoffs with each of them?
And which ones are more difficult to implement than others?
This video highlights the pros and cons of all the current options available.
All right.
And that is going to do it for this week's show.
I hope you enjoyed it.
If you want to learn more about any of the projects we covered, including plans
or pictures or code, check out the links down in the description.
And while you're there, give us a thumbs up,
or leave us a comment telling us about your favorite project
and subscribe so you won't miss out on the next one.
As always, huge
thanks to Digi-Key for making this whole show possible,
and to you for watching.
Take care.
We'll see you soon.