This week on Maker Update, a TV for lazy people, a Lego Crickit rover, milk jug skulls, an EL nixie clock, a boat, a box, a rock tumbler, LED holders, and Tinkercad’s new Fusion feature.

This week on Maker Update, a 100 foot slip and slide, two kinds of zoetrope, an open source test tube rocker, car lock pinball, a new issue of Make, diffusing LEDs, and a chance to win one of my favorite maker books.

The Kreg Rip-Cut Circular Saw Guide (Amazon link) is a $32 guide for a circular saw. It’s great if you have a small workshop, or no workshop.

If you have a table saw, there’s probably no reason to buy this. But if you have a small garage like mine and you don’t want to surrender the space and money to have a table saw, this and a circular saw are an effective way to accurately break down sheets of wood.

This is review is for the Dremel Versa Tip butane soldering torch (Amazon link). It’s sells for around $38 on Amazon Prime. This is a portable soldering iron/heat gun/hot cutter/wood burning tool, that runs on butane. You click to light it, use the lock to keep the flame on, and then you adjust it for the temperature you need.

This week on Maker Update, an RC strandbeest that shoots fireworks, Raspbian gets an update, a shape-shifting dragon drone, motorized cocktail umbrellas, warped audio boxes, cardboard techniques, the Adafruit Feather M4 Express, making custom LEDs, and does Bob Clagett have too much glue?

This week on Maker Update, Alexa presses buttons, Google gets a laser, robot fish, robot dogs, 1-dimensional pong, drill bits, speed squares, an unholy union of DeWalt and Ryobi, and a resistor kit roundup.

Project Notes

Original project by Jay Rugland:
https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:1248463

Blue Spade Terminals (Amazon Associate link):
https://amzn.to/2MJLz0C

Similar Dewalt 18 volt to Dewalt Lithium Ion 20 Volt Adapter, but w/ Battery Monitor
https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:1270617

$20 Surebonder Dewalt-to-Ryobi adapter:
https://surebonder.com/products/dew-20v-ryobi%C2%AE-to-dewalt%C2%AE-battery-adapter

They also make a Milwaukee-to-Ryobi adapter (Amazon Associate link):
https://amzn.to/2tinJB7

More project reviews:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLHvctKwAXIO_ewpuKb1RXqez5NCSbeANj

This week on Maker Update, an Alexa-powered L3 droid, a pedal-powered art machine, a robot snake, robot bread, an FPV rover, last call for cocktail robots, and creative clamping techniques.

If you do any soldering you probably have a pair of helping hands, or some bulky heavy thing like this that can hold your project or components steady while you wire them. They’re useful, but a little clunky to travel with, and often overkill if you’re just splicing a wire or two.

In terms of price and portability, poster tack (a.k.a. poster putty) is a great alternative.

This week on Maker Update, a paper airplane machine, Microsoft gobbles up Github, a comic vomit bot, a LEGO-style megaphone, printer cable coasters, counting bees, joining wood with plastic bottles, and actual reality games in Hong Kong. This week’s Cool Tool is the Komelon 25Ft tape measure.