This week on Maker Update: a Transforming Bicycle, Bench modifications with Trash, A Glowing Etch-A-Sketch, Robot Hands, Expensive Lumber and How to Use Any Filament.

++Show Notes [Maker Update Ep. 230]++

-=Project of the Week=-

Hydraulic Bicycle by Colin Furze
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAPumW_wYKc

-=News=-

2 new tools from Tim Sway
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BjOKxsN5ptA

-=More Projects=-

Glowing etch a sketch
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bas-eybX3JA

Fixing a bench with Trash by Laura Kampf
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RbQGLaLDEA4

Building your own prosthetic hand with Ian Davis
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yk36WKSlsqA

Vaccination Card Multipass by Adafruit
https://blog.adafruit.com/2021/04/22/multi-pass-holder-3dthursday-3dprinting/

-=Tips & Tools=-

How to use any filament
https://youtu.be/vSwumoSlZTo

Secret life of components: Glue
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qDwdFmU6A_w

Why is Lumber so expensive by Belinda Carr
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HIBAvyt88To

Tips Tools & Shop Tales
https://www.getrevue.co/profile/garethbranwyn/issues/gareth-s-tips-tools-and-shop-tales-issue-88-565731

-=Digi-Key Spotlight=-

DK Red PCB Service
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hWYLANX0pYU

Transcript

This Week on Maker Update: A Transforming Bicycle, Fixing Benches with Trash, A Glowing Etch-A-Sketch, Robot Hands, Expensive Lumber and How to Use Any Filament

Hello and welcome back to another Maker Update. I’m tyler winegarner, and I hope you’re doing great and finding ways to stay inspired and connected in this crazy world we’re in. I’ve got an awesome show full of great projects for you, so let’s start off with the project of the week.

The way a bicycle feels and rides is determined by the shape of its frame. And the frame of a bicycle is usually rigid. Usually. But Colin Furze has created a bicycle where nearly every single one of its frame members is replaced with a hydraulic piston, to create a bicycle that can modify its own shape to explore the different ways a bicycle can ride.

This thing is crazy – the top tube, down tube, forks, and seat stays have all been replaced with hydraulic pistons. It was easier for Colin to build all of the frame structures from scratch than to try and modify an existing bicycle frame, and you get to see the entire process in a comical build montage. You also see all of Colin’s bike modification expertise at play here – including all of the custom tools he’s built to cut angular holes in frame tubes.

The hydraulics are actuated by a single electric motor that drives the pump. The hydraulic fluid is directed through a valved manifold, so you can direct the pressure where you want it to go – open the valve for the forks, and the forks get longer. With all of the tubing for the hydraulics, the bike certainly has a look, and, kind of a cool one.

As to how it rides? It sounds like it leaves a lot to be desired. The bike is very heavy, tipping the scales at over 100 pounds. Plus, hydraulic pistons just aren’t as rigid as steel tubes, so it does wobble around quite a bit. But I don’t think you’ll find a bike that’s a better learning tool about how frame geometry affects how a bike rides. Colin tries out a number of bizarre trame styles and rides all of them. Its a fun video, go check it out.

Woodworder, guitar maker and all around good guy Tim Sway has just announced new tools that he’s planning on manufacturing and they’re presently in the prototyping phase: The Sqwayre X and the Sqwayre L.  These are both measuring tools that work similar to the depth gauge on a set of calipers, but are made to be a little bit earlier to use. Because the reference surface is larger, its easier to get a good read of the depth you’re trying to measure. The Squayre X has an additional slide ruler perpendicular to the first, opening more measuring options. If these sound useful to you, you can learn more about their production following the links down in the description.

More projects! Sam from Look Mum no Computer hacked this old x/y plotter into this glow-in-the-dark etch-a-sketch. Sam got really obsessed with plotters after visiting the Mono art studio in Berlin, and who could blame him. His idea for this project was to make it so the plotter could be used to draw manually, but he wanted to avoid using any of the costly and hard to find consumables. Instead of pen and paper, he’s using photoreactive paper and an ultraviolet laser. The joystick makes it easy to do simple drawings, but things get really nuts when he hooks it up to one of his many synths to plot the music as a drawing. Cool stuff.

While on a walk with her dog Smudo, Laura kampf found this broken bench along the rhein river in her city of Cologne, and tasked herself with repairing it so folks could enjoy it again. She’s been trying to not spend any money on materials for her projects, and her neighbor happened to have just the perfect material for municipal upcycling: Pallet wood. The bench seats themselves are gorgeous, but I love the expression here: finding something broken in your community, and instead of asking for permission to make it better, just doing it. We could all use a little bit more of that energy in our lives right now.

We have to talk about the incredible engineering being done by Ian Davis in his mission to build his own ideal prosthetic hand. You’ve probably seen some of his videos being kicked around social media with this impressive mechanical hand. Its all made of machined aluminum and its beautiful to behold.  Both the grasping motion and finger splay are driven mechanically, And he is currently working on a system that will use micro stepper motors to lock the fingers. The steppers will be driven by an arduino that responds to myoelectric sensors. Along the way, he’s taking time to have fun with the possibilities of having a replaceable hand.

And over on the Adafruit blog, I found this Fifth-Element style multipass holder for your CDC vaccination card.. Hopefully you’re able to get into a vaccination appointment and are able to fill out that card. If you’re looking for a stylish way to show it off as we figure out how to re-socialize again, check out this 3d printable multipass holder from level2three. This is a three part print, perfect for helping you gain access to restaurants, museums, and whatever else you want to get into in your post covid life.

Now for some tips and tools, Zach Freedman has a new video out,and its a helpful guide to how to use just about any 3d printer filament. I’ve been reluctantly making the transition out of my comfy happy place of printing everything in PLA to using PETG. If you’re still in that happy place, you’ll be well served, Zach spends the first third of the video just talking about the different variants of PLA. It’s a long video and there’s plenty to chew on here, but tons of useful advice as well.

We’ve been talking up Tim Hunkin’s youtube series The Secret Life of Components an awful lot, but his recent episode about glue is a special gem. Glues are one of the critical components that literally hold all of our projects together, but we probably don’t understand what they do and how they work anywhere near as much as we depend on them. This video will give you a greater appreciation for how glues work and how to select the right one for the task at hand.

If you’ve wandered around the sheet goods section of your local home center, you’ve found that the prices of lumber are impossible to ignore, and you’ve probably wondered why. Belinda Carr has this fantastic video about how both supply chain issues and a boom in housing building have contributed to this financial pinch in our hobby. It won’t make the the prices of lumber come down any faster, but at least will give you a greater appreciation of why things are the way they are

In the most recent edition of Gareth Branwyn’s Tips, Tools and Shop Tales newsletter he showcases videos from Project Farm determining what is the best tape measure you can buy, and an older video from Jeremy Fielding about how to build your projects without spending any money. 

For this week’s Digikey spotlight, we need to talk about Digikey Red. Digikey red is the company’s own PCB manufacturing service. DK Red is offering a 2-layer PCB manufacturing service at $1.50 per square inch and a minimum manufacturing run at four boards per order with a ten day turnaround. The color selection for your boards is limited, but otherwise, this seems like a fantastic offering.

And that is going to do it for this week’s show – thank you so much for watching. I hope you enjoyed watching it as much as I enjoyed making it. If you did, give us a thumbs up, or leave us a comment. As always, big thanks to our friends at Digikey for making this show possible and having all the cool parts that make our projects work. Take care out there, and we’ll see you soon.