Metrix Create:Space

The Return of LearnMakeCupcake!

Tue, 09 Mar 2010 00:45:00 -0500

The fine UW students behind LearnMakeCupcake are back at Metrix again tonight to make final adjustments and their very first print on their newly completed Cupcake CNC. Let’s watch their progress:

Kevin delivers the LearnMakeCupcake MakerBot.

Kate takes a snack break. (Do not try to eat plastic teapots at home)

It takes a village to build a MakerBot.

Bre teaches the Paduan Bot Builders.

The First Print Doodle! Progress is being made!!

LearnMakeCupcake Class Portrait

BASK IN THE GLORY!

Mon, 08 Mar 2010 21:36:25 -0500

BASK IN THE GLORY!

Just wanted to mention that Bre Pettis (geek’s love him,...

Mon, 08 Mar 2010 21:25:17 -0500

Just wanted to mention that Bre Pettis (geek’s love him, crafters want to be him) is down at Metrix tonight for a visit. Even though it’s not officially MakerBot night, Bre’s got his totally pimped out Cupcake CNC out (both can be seen above) and is test-driving his prototype heated build platform. Our newly complete Mendel is also making an appearance looking totally badass and technically functional.

Sometimes, we see projects go from start to finish in a day,...

Tue, 02 Mar 2010 14:50:51 -0500

Sometimes, we see projects go from start to finish in a day, mostly we see our shop projects take longer than we’d like, and other times, we get to see just a slice of something that can change the world.

I’ve mentioned before that in our first week, someone came in and made a “DNA cloning machine”. I still don’t really understand what PCR really means, I’m not a wetware guy. I do understand the massive changes that happen in the world when you take a technology that costs several thousand dollars and bring it down to near-zero. I also understand how awesome it is when people get together and build things. It totally helps when there is a video to explain it all.

LavaAmp is the result of the collaboration of Rob Carlson and his engineering partner, Rik Wehbring, founders of Biodesic, a Bioengineering firm, Jim Hardy, bioentrepreneur founder of Gahaga Biosciences, Joseph Jackson, a philosopher interested in Open Science and DIY Biology and Guido David Nunez-Mujica, a Computational Biologist.

They all met at Science Foo Camp, and decided to develop, manufacture and market a simple, inexpensive device to perform PCR, which is the backbone of molecular biology.

They are at the prototype stage, and gathering funds to go to production. If you want to help change the world, please sponsor their project!

I knew they were on to something when they wanted me to cut those polycarbonate donuts…

Workshops in the works

Mon, 15 Feb 2010 23:46:28 -0500

It seems people aren’t satisfied with just two different workshops. Our intro and transistors workshops have been filling up like mad, but you’re still clamoring for more. We’re finally listening to you, and we’ve got a new soldering workshop debuting next month.

Not only that, we’ve got a few new things in the works. Rumor has it we may even start teaching Arduino workshops. Stay tuned to find out more. For now, you’ll have to be content with these three. As always, our workshops require pre-registration in person at the shop.

Introduction to Electronics
We’ll be having three of these throughout March. These are one day workshops, so don’t register for more than one.
Sunday, March 7 from 2 to 4:30
Sunday, March 14 from 2 to 4:30
Saturday, March 27 from 6:30 to 9
Cost: $40

This workshop covers everything you need to know to get started in electronics. We’ll start from the basics of electricity and work our way up to using integrated circuits. You’ll leave the class with some simple components and the knowledge to use them.

Using Transistors
Sunday, March 21 2010
2-4:30
Cost: $40

We’ll explore transistors, what they’re used for, and how to use them. After an overview of the function of transistors, we’ll spend the class making some simple switches, logic gates, and an amplifier.

Required Equipment:
Breadboard, Multimeter

Intro to Soldering
Sunday, March 28 from 2 to 4:30
Cost: $40

This workshop will go over soldering through hole components. We’ll give you an electronics kit and walk you through putting it together, giving you all the tips and soldering techniques you need to make it work. We’ll also give you a soldering station along with the class.

Processing at 911 Media

If all of that workshop-y goodness isn’t enough for you, you may want to check out the Processing workshop given by our friends at 911 media.

http://www.911media.org/education/classes/processing-beginning.html

4 Tuesdays: March 16 - April 6; 6:30 - 9:30 PM

Members Price: $275
Non Members Price: $335
This course is designed for creative thinkers who are interested in expressing their ideas through code or creating custom software tools. The course focuses on Processing, a coding language developed specifically for artistic applications. It is easy to learn for non-programmers yet powerful enough for seasoned programmers to rapidly develop concepts. Processing has the added benefit of being a free and open source tool that is used by a large and very active community of creative minds internationally. Learning Processing begins with very simple ideas like drawing basic geometry and colors on screen, but can expand in many directions ranging from physical interfaces to complex networked applications.

It’s a fact: makers love homemade gifts. Valentine’s...

Tue, 09 Feb 2010 23:27:28 -0500

It’s a fact: makers love homemade gifts. Valentine’s Day is no exception to this rule, so when you’re thinking about what to give that special person, think about making it yourself. A homemade gift takes more thought and effort than something you just buy at a store, so it means more.

We here at Metrix Create:Space understand that and we want to help you make Valentine’s Day special. We’ve been whipping up some new romantic things that you can make here. You can laser cut your own design into acrylic for edge lighting or print out a heartfelt keepsake. We can even help you sew something for your valentine.

There’s only five days until Valentine’s Day, so you better start your gifts soon.

Sometimes you wonder about things. Strange things. I’ve...

Fri, 05 Feb 2010 16:37:35 -0500

Sometimes you wonder about things. Strange things. I’ve been watching the stepper motor row in the vending machine, and seeing motors quickly disappear. I wonder where they go. It seemed like yesterday we had a huge box of them. Mostly, I don’t know what happens to them. They go to live a second or maybe third life somewhere, in some project. The machine is just a temporal stop in their exciting life of spin and step.

Sometimes though, people bring their projects in, and we get a peek at their new function and snap a blurry picture. A few weeks ago, Michael came by to show us his propeller powered etch-a-sketch. We were all amazed. We boggled at the speed, accuracy and awesomeness of this project, then we wondered how he did it.

Now we know. He’s detailed every gory detail (including source) of the propetcher here. It’s also up on Hackaday, which has some less blurry pictures than our Flickr stream, as well as the normal flurry of helpful suggestions from the peanut gallery.

If you’ve been curious how to drive our 3 wire steppers, Michael has also produced this very helpful diagram.

Last night, Dominic Muren, Willow Brughe and I presented a...

Thu, 04 Feb 2010 15:07:00 -0500

Last night, Dominic Muren, Willow Brughe and I presented a night of “Fab Lab” to the Dorkbot Seattle crowd. I saw later on twitter that some 120+ people showed up, which is not only uncommon for dorkbot, but it shows that whole physical computing and home fabrication thing is generating lots of interest.

Dominic’s talk was awesome, and it covered pretty much every way to digitally fabricate things. He’s annotating the whole thing with links and should be uploading it to Humblefacture shortly, so if you didn’t make it to the talk, you should dig through the slides. Probably the best list of fabbing technologies and software for modeling I’ve seen in a while. Makes me want to rethink my current toolchains.

Willow Brugh, director of Jigsaw Renaissance, talked about their space in SODO, admittedly hard to find and hard to type, it sounds like a fun place to hang out. They’re a non-profit, under the umbrella of Milwaukee-based Bucketworks, and they have some access to Artillery’s tools. This is the second time we’ve met. Last was at KUOW. Hopefully I can get down to Jigsaw one of these days and check it out. Sounds interesting. Too bad it’s not within my ridiculously short live/work radius.

Milo the makerbot hummed away for a while on a print, but ultimately it’s extruder failed. The makerbot portion of my presentation didn’t get to have a live maple syrup smelling robot giving birth to a Mendel extruder. Suck.

We adorned him with flashy LEDs and magnets, but the demo gods were not amused. More robot maintenance in my future. Unsurprising.

I had a presentation, but I tried to keep it informal, I talked about the history of .\C:_ (most people ask), how it came together so quickly (i have the most awesome friends ever), and about some of the things that happen in our strange basement on Broadway. Dorkbot threatened to put the video up on their website soon, and I’ve shared my slides on Google Docs. I’m sure neither will make sense without the context of being there.

The star of the night for me was Professor Mark Ganter, who wasn’t on the schedule, but who has voided the warranty on his departments 5 zcorp printers by printing ceramic and glass. Apparently you can print different materials than $1000 per oz zcorp plastics, all of which are dirt cheap. The glass dust he uses is a byproduct of glass recycling, and is next to free. Printing in wood is easy if you have micron scale wood dust, which is something laser cutting produces. The binders are as simple as cheap vodka and maltodextrin, both easily available at local stores. He has dropped the costs on printing to nothing.

This is huge stuff. Commercial 3D printing is a racket, and the costs ($600 for a gallon of comercial binder) of something so potentially world-changing is ridiculous.

Ganter is putting all of this up on Open3DP, another amazing move for a professor at a University that lives on patents

What happens if you dont have a zCorp printer?

There is a guy in Brazil who has made a Homemade 3D Powder Printer out of an old Lexmark printer. Once we figure out the logistics of where to put something like this, and how we can make it relatively safe (glass dust is probably off the table), I think we’ve got a new shop project. And with that, more maintenance. Awesome.

We're big on CHS Blog

Wed, 03 Feb 2010 03:09:16 -0500

We're big on CHS Blog:

What ho? We were featured on CHS Blog again? Goodness!

Darivanh Vlachos, Alexis Hope and Kate MacCorkle (from left to...

Sun, 17 Jan 2010 04:10:00 -0500

Darivanh Vlachos, Alexis Hope and Kate MacCorkle (from left to right above) came down to Metrix this evening to learn about MakerBots. This is not in itself noteworthy, especially since we’re pretty much the only shop in the neighborhood with any. What was different about this visit was that Darivanh, Alexis and Kate are all part of the Human Centered Design and Engineering at UW. They’re going to be making a MakerBot and documenting how they learn how to make and use it as their class project on how everyday, non-technical folks learn how to use technology.

This is possibly the most meta and intellectual use of Metrix I have yet to write about. It’s especially meta when I consider the fact that I am now documenting the documentation of their project…woo, recursion vertigo. Anyway, one more example of just how interesting and creative things can get when you put a bunch of tools in a basement open to the general public.

Here at Metrix Create:Space, we don’t really sell coffee. ...

Tue, 12 Jan 2010 21:26:16 -0500

Here at Metrix Create:Space, we don’t really sell coffee. We provide it as an amenity to our members and customers and we drink a lot of it ourselves. It does cost a dollar, but that dollar doesn’t go into paying staff, or rent, or even paying back the upfront cost of the robot (eventually we’ll pay for that thing somehow). It goes towards Vivace beans, our nifty poker draw cups, milk, and tasty tasty Oregon Chai. We’re not a coffee shop. We’re a workshop. We like coffee, it keeps us moving, so we have the good stuff.

We do understand how coffee shops work , and how you and many of the laptop carrying, working-from-home mobile workforce out there live within their rules. You see, at one time, we worked on software, and we were laptop hobos.

Working from home, or working ‘out of the office’ is a hard thing (well, it’s not hard like a salt mine or working at a desk or anything, but it can be inconvenient). For the most part, coffee shops have become the haven of the hobo. There are lots of social rules to setting up camp in a coffee shop. Mostly they involve picking up a coffee or a pastry every now and then, trying not to tie a table up every single day at the same place, tipping the barista kind of heavy so they don’t glare at you (too hard), not bringing in packed lunches and outside drinks. There’s a fine line you tread to not wear out your welcome, or run the place out of business. That’s why you’re buying the scones even though you don’t really like them. That’s why you don’t sleep much. It’s not the stress of the workplace, it’s the 4 latte a day habit.

Coffee shops, have become the third place for workers, some by design, some by accident. For the most part though, coffee shops focus on their coffee, not their Internet. And for coffee shops, the Internet is an amenity that they have to have, rarely understand and don’t like paying for. Lots of coffee shops don’t even have a computer in them other than a cash register. Which is why their Internet is slow and laggy.

Here at our workshop, we spend a lot of time working on our robots, building shop projects, buying tools and supplies and going about the things we need to do to make your projects go smoother. For that we need the Internet, and we like the Internet, so we make sure our Internet is awesome.

Some of you may have noticed that there is effectively no lag at Metrix Create:Space. That’s because we have fast tubes (50mbps/10mpbs). We have a managed Cisco switch rather than a linksys hub. Our WiFi gear is from our ‘other store’, which primarily sells WiFi gear to people building WiFi businesses. We give you a publicly routeable IPV6 address. If the wireless is too slow for you (because 802.11g is only 20mbps), we even have a couple of wall jacks that you can plug in to, and get the full 50. Remember we mentioned that we like the Internet here? That may have been an understatement.

Unfortunately, this makes us both appealing to the laptop hobo , and confusing. The rules are different here. It’s a new thing. We don’t have scones. The coffee doesn’t really pay for anything. How can you hobo without running us out of business? We know a lot of you are concerned about how we survive, because you ask us, and sometimes we wonder ourselves. We have thought about your concerns, and are offering you an option.

Today we are introducing Hobo Tokens and an actual tip jar. Hobo Tokens are a totally optional currency of goodwill. They let us know that you care about us, and remind us to keep that awesome Internet connection around. There are no rules, you can buy them and lock them up in a curio cabinet, give them away as gifts, or put them in the tip jar. They have no monetary value and are worth nothing in the store. Rest assured though, if you hobo hard, and you tip us in tokens, we know you care about the shop.

Like the rest of the shop, this is kind of a weird experiment.

They’re available online (we will mail them wherever you want) or at the counter for $5. 5 for $20

We’ll also put them on Thingiverse. They take 3 minutes each to cut, so if you cut them yourselves, they’re $4.80 each. If you have your own laser and material, they’re free goodwill.

Our first Using Transistors workshop went well today. We managed...

Mon, 11 Jan 2010 02:57:45 -0500

Our first Using Transistors workshop went well today. We managed to
continue the tradition of blowing up at least one component per class.
This time it was a transistor that shattered due to excessive current.
As usual, the exploding component served to highlight the facts
covered in the class. The workshop attendees got to play with logic
gates, switches, sensors, and motors.

Interest in both of our electronics workshops has remained strong. The
Intro to Electronics workshop on Thursday has been full for a few
weeks, and we already have people on the waiting list for our next
classes. Next month we’ll be having another set of electronics
workshops, so register early to reserve your spot.

We haven’t forgotten about those of you who want a soldering workshop.
We’re hard at work designing a workshop that’s worthy of you. As soon
as we’ve got a curriculum we’re satisfied with, we’ll start scheduling
the soldering workshops.

Introduction to Electronics
Sunday, February 7 2010
2-4:30
Cost: $40

This workshop covers everything you need to know to get started in
electronics. We’ll start from the basics of electricity and work our
way up to using integrated circuits. You’ll leave the class with some
simple components and the knowledge to use them.

Using Transistors
Sunday, February 21 2010
2-4:30
Cost: $40

We’ll explore transistors, what they’re used for, and how to use them.
After an overview of the function of transistors, we’ll spend the
class making some simple switches, logic gates, and an amplifier.

Required Equipment:
Breadboard, Multimeter

Morgan’s tasty transistors workshop - transistors are like...

Sun, 10 Jan 2010 21:56:37 -0500

Morgan’s tasty transistors workshop - transistors are like delicious grilled cheese sandwiches, except that if you eat them you will get sick. Also, transistors can do a lot more neat things than a sandwich can.

~ Jen

Jesse and Angela (pic 2, right) were down here tonight make some...

Sat, 09 Jan 2010 03:08:00 -0500

Jesse and Angela (pic 2, right) were down here tonight make some nifty LED light boards (pics 1 & 4) - when those things are on it’s like Christmas all over again. You can’t see it in the still shots, but they can be programmed to oscillate and generally look even more spectacular. They’re from a kit for LED light bricks, but Angela and Jesse are going to put them in a translucent acrylic case rather than setting them in an acrylic brick so they can access the board to reprogram it later if they want.

Their friends Kevin and Jaime (pic 2, left) were also down here putting together bliplaces (pic 3), sound-reactive LED button kits they got from the vending machine of wonder. That’s a pretty impressive night’s work for some first-time solderers, and they got to walk away with a badass homemade piece of shiny.

~ Jen

He did it! At approximately 3am this morning, Matt finally...

Thu, 07 Jan 2010 20:56:13 -0500

He did it! At approximately 3am this morning, Matt finally finished the 2-axis laser writer he’s been working for the past week. Congratulations Matt :)

~ Jen

I feel so productive (hurray for Kraft Nite)

Wed, 06 Jan 2010 01:22:21 -0500

Wow, Kraft Nite is doing wonders for my productivity…I made seven wooden cog pins, I’m on my way to finishing a couple more little hip-pockets, and I’ve got pictures of everything I made. It’s amazing what you can pull of if you just have the right tools. If I can do all that in a few hours, just think of all the progress you could make on your own crafty goodness :D

There’s also a fractal quilt in progress - if you stop by in a few Kraft Nites from now, you might even get to see the finished product.

Jen Power is a nerdy crafter, Cap Hill resident, and writer of Life on the Hill and Other Stories

Yay, Kraft Nite! If you want to join the fun, just stop by any...

Wed, 06 Jan 2010 01:10:00 -0500

Yay, Kraft Nite! If you want to join the fun, just stop by any Tuesday night after 6pm and get your craft on :)

The member badges have been cut. If you signed up for a...

Mon, 04 Jan 2010 14:42:09 -0500

The member badges have been cut. If you signed up for a membership in 2009, your very own, uniquely identifiable badge is now ready for you to pick up.

Yes, there is a secret contest. I’ve probably said too much.

Happy New Year! (T minus 6 hours)

Thu, 31 Dec 2009 21:25:00 -0500

It’s New Year’s Eve, and what am I doing? Hanging out in the best basement EVER. And getting lured into blogging for Metrix cuz, well, I hang out here too much anyway, and I might as well write about it. So while everyone else is getting drunk waaay too early in order to be obnoxious well before midnight, I’ll be here watching Helen Cook make laser-cut puzzle boxes and while I create tiny adorable purses out of upholstery fabric samples. And blogging about it.

Jen Power is your friendly neighborhood geekcraft blogger, as well as the author/pontificator of Life on the Hill and Other Stories

If you’ve been around the shop lately, you’ve...

Thu, 24 Dec 2009 06:49:03 -0500

If you’ve been around the shop lately, you’ve probably heard us mention that we’re going to build Johnathan Wards’ MTM PCB Mill. We’ve been making good progress.

We don’t have a shopbot, and our first attempt at getting some parts made on a neighbor’s CNC didn’t work out, so we lasercut our assembly out of 6mm plywood and did a bit of glue work to get a nice solid frame. This not only looks nice, it gives us a lot more control over how we can build the thing. Turns out the first failure was a good thing because other than the initial body, our mill isn’t going to be very much like the original at all. Which is of course the point of Open Source Hardware. It’s not really a blueprint, it’s a starting point.

We’ve been really interested in is seeing if we could build the mill without going through the MTM BOM. Sure, it’s reasonable pricing if you’re looking at CNC mills, but buying 108 bucks worth of Frelon lined linear bearings when we already have a bunch of tools that make tools seems silly. We can make linear bearings. We have a makerbot and a spool of HDPE (slippery plastic for the uninitiated). Add to that we have printer rods in the Junk Box, extra threaded rod from our second makerbot build, stepper motors, drivers, arduinos, DC motors, and pounds upon pounds of screws and nuts. We started looking around the shop and figured out we can make this thing with stuff we have laying around. Once it’s built, we can use it to make itself better too!

Tonight was all about hacksaws and printing with HDPE for the first time. It was a bit of effort, but we got all our rods cut and built an X axis that slides pretty smooth. We also got some ideas for the next round of cuts, which we should be able to fit in the scrap from the first round. We’ll keep you updated on our progress, and publish our plans so you can make what we do, and change what you want.

Once it’s done, we’re going to put this robot to work. Come in and make surface mount PCBs in a little under an hour.

If you’re wondering how to make boards (we sure are), we’ve started up a wiki page on the toolchain that the Center for Bits and Atoms uses. It’s pretty cool stuff.