Making things – Diary of an Emacs tragic

USB Battery pack 3d printed case

Jason — Tue, 14 May 2024 03:36:06 +0000

I had a USB Battery pack who’s case got smashed. so I designed and 3d printed a new case, and while I was at it, added a newer circuit board to it that has USB-C charging capability.

PCB: https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005001965710528.html

Onshape 3D design

The lid of the case is super-glued down. I was going to make it a screw closed lid but the design effort and sourcing of suitable screws was just too hard. If I ever need to open the case I’ll just 3D print a new case (probably with some enhancements).

I made a braided cord bracelet

Jason — Sun, 04 Jun 2017 05:38:41 +0000

I made a braided cord bracelet. Cordage came from Decathelon
Instructions thanks to the WhyKnot YouTube Channel

I made a ukulele tuner web app

Jason — Wed, 12 Apr 2017 13:16:28 +0000

Ukulele by texasfeel (CC BY-ND 2.0)

I got sick of all the ukulele tuner apps so I decided to make my own. The best ukulele tuner app I’ve found on the iPhone works by repeatedly playing the note you are tuning to rather than trying to analyse the audio and display the frequency of the note it detects. The human ear is still better than software at doing that in my opinion.
It’s pure html and javascript. I used the howlerjs javascript framework for playing the audio as I found the basic javascript audio functions not precise enough for the looping.
The audio samples came from freesound.org courtesy stomachache.
Ukulele Tuner

Finished my workbench!

Jason — Tue, 29 Nov 2016 11:45:15 +0000

I finished my workbench. It took me about 12 months and a broken toe to do it. Very happy with the result but now I need to fit the vice. I copied Paul Sellers’ design from his YouTube videos. In fact his videos inspired me to get into woodworking to start with.

Origami Octahemioctahedron

Jason — Thu, 08 Sep 2016 14:40:07 +0000

I made an Octahemioctahedron from John Montroll’s book A Plethora of Polyhedra in Origami

A Square Troublewit

Jason — Sat, 27 Aug 2016 10:51:22 +0000

I made an origami square troublewit.

Origami sunken octahedron

Jason — Tue, 23 Aug 2016 13:45:08 +0000

Another John Montroll model, this time from A Plethora of Polyhedra. A sunken octahedron.

Origami platonic solids

Jason — Sat, 20 Aug 2016 10:51:56 +0000

I’ve been making some of these platonic solids in origami. Thanks to John Montroll’s books

From left to right. A tetrahedron, a cube and an octahedron.

Poor man’s router with wedge fail

Jason — Tue, 16 Aug 2016 12:05:45 +0000

I tried making a Paul Seller’s style Poor Man’s Router plane. It worked quite well but I couldn’t get the chisel’s blade edge to be really perpendicular to the surface of the wood. As an alternative I thought I’d try cutting a slot into the piece of timber and making a wedge to fit it to hold the chisel in place.

As much as I tried I couldn’t get the wedge to hold the chisel firmly enough that it wouldn’t slide up once I started cutting into wood with it. I think this was partly to do with it being a bevel edge chisel. This meant there was less surface area in contact with the wood, so less friction and easier to slip.
I might try making a hardwood wedge for it. I also need to try a firmer chisel instead of a bevel edge one. The extra surface area might be enough to hold it.

Workbench progress

Jason — Tue, 16 Aug 2016 05:25:19 +0000

Test fitting the wedge that secures the leg to the skirt

Wedge retainer fitted

At last the bench self supports with the fitting of the first skirt

Workbench tops resting on the leg struts