[ossum] has a baby on the way. He admits that he got a bit carried away, brimming with parental excitement. What resulted is a fully articulated LED WiFi lamp that blooms and glows dramatically in the friendly confines of the oncoming baby’s room.
We’ve covered [ossum]’s work before. As usual, he started off by showing his complete mastery of Fusion360 and making the rest of us look bad. If you want to learn 360, we recommend scrobbing through his models to see how it’s done. The base encloses an ESP8266 and a hobby servo. A clever mechanism pulls down on a stranded steel cable that runs through the stem along with some control lines for the LEDS. This opens and closes the petals. The LEDs are all held in a 3D printed frame which produces a nice even glow.
If you’d like to build one yourself, there’s a full video viewable after the break. Files are available on Thingiverse. Just make sure you tune up your printer first, this is a tough one.
How do People do all that work with allen keys.
I would jump out of the window if I had to.
There are screw drivers or do they have that much time on there hands.
And what is is with these metric screws. They cost a arm and a leg and are not getable (I like that word)
easily in Canada and the U.S.
I tried to get some last week. It cost me over $20 and it didn’t even fill a thimble.
Metric is easy to design for in 3D rpgorams and don’t require the charts like I do for imperial. The reason for using Allen sockets is along similar lines to the reason you’d prefer an imperial philips screw. Because of 3D printing I’ve bought boxes of 3-5 mm metric Allen machine screws ,while allowing for a longer lead time with shipping, were not that expensive per screw that way. I don’t have a use for those extras in normal use like I would a variety pack of imperial Phillips head screws, so I make use of the, for my 3D printed designs.
Ugh that’ll teach me to post on hackaday from my iPad without proof reading. Sorry for the pain my poor spelling causes. Any bills incurred from this due to bleeding of the eyes can be billed to Apple. Thanks.
There are some easy imperial alternatives available on the cheap for any metric fasteners listed, you just need to look the nearest equivalent up.
example M3*.5 = UNC4-40
Alot can just be used directly in place of there metrics, well maybe with a tiny bit of drilling or a size up if you dont like the fit.
Some good refrence charts:
http://elginfasteners.com/resources/metric-bolt-conversion-metric-to-standard-bolt-conversion/
Suppose I should jump in here since it was me doing the work… I used metric because that’s what we use in South Africa and they are cheap as chips for me.
Regarding the allen keys, I agree fully on the risk of window jumping, but they have one distinct benefit, you can see in the assembly video how I needed one to put in the last petal linkage, there was simply no space for a screwdriver. That is the reason I have a whole range of cap screws on hand, because they give me the most angles of access for fastening (I can’t think of a more elegant way to say that, but you know what I mean) when designing stuff on the fly..
Fair point, but in this particular case, wouldn’t pins have been a better/cheaper solution?
Definitely better mechanically. Cheaper too if one had them on hand. I had a hacksaw, a pile of M3 screws and a few minutes to complete the project, so my criteria were different.
To be honest, I’m not actually sure how easy it is to source 3mm pins of a particular length, not that easy where I’m from I don’t think.
No, it is exactly the other way round. I can get metric screws around “every second corner” or have them in a parts bin. I do not have inch screws except some leftovers from computer cases.
No, I do not live in Canada or US.
You know I like the responses that I got with this.
I agree with you all and I guess it is my location an upbringing.
Ive been a electrician for over 20 years and am the guy that if they wanted a messed up or complicated job done they would call me. I gess what Im trying to say It is my location that sucks for getting things.
Thanks everyone for helping me get on the right path.
And I apologize for not saying anything about this hackaday project.
It is very good and if I had the hardware I would give it a try as a christmas present to my wife. she could always use her day brighten up a little every day.
Ahhh.., the metric vs. imperial fasteners war… They both hold things just as well, if you choose the right parameters! Metric does seem to have a much better defined set of options, of which most people don’t know about – even in places that sell nothing but screws. Unlike what most think, metric threads are not fixed to a particular pitch for a particular thread diameter, but using the ‘accepted’ or ‘standard’ pitch is strongly encouraged (mostly because getting other thread pitches is so difficult). Because of that, I can ask for an M3 and know exactly what I’m getting, and know that 99.9 repeater percent of the time it will fit your metric tapped 3mm hole.
Problem with bigger threads happens because the ‘standard’ metric is a coarse pitch (like UNC). It is hard to get fine pitch metric (similar to UNF), but it is certainly possible.
And I love allen (hex hole) headed screws. Slot screws just ache to be burred, and Philips/pozi are not far behind. Torx are also nice, but uncommon and usually expensive. Buying hex drivers is actually pretty easy, but most outlets just sell the hex bits for a generic bit driver, and they suck.
Regardless of metric or standard, and regardless of the fact that cheap DIY furniture flat packed utilizing them (likely because an allen key is so easy to include as a throw away), I’d rather socket head cap screws over phillips or flat any day. Just saying.
Also, on topic, that design is pretty awesome. I enjoyed that.