[Ian's] Global Geek Tour: New York

[Ian Lesnet], founder of Dangerous Prototypes and Hackaday alumnus, entertains us once again with his Global Geek Tour. This time around he’s visited New York City for the Open Source Hardware Summit, Maker Faire, and a tour of the geeky attractions the city has to offer.

There’s a 25-minute video embedded after the break. [Ian] starts off with an homage to [Anthony Bourdain] but don’t worry, that subsides after a couple of minutes. This year he skipped the hotel and rented an apartment in the village for the same price. After making a survey of the local food offerings he heads off to the OSH Summit. There are interviews with a lot of big names in the industry, as well as a look at some distillery hardware and a mobile hackerspace built in an old ambulance acquired from Craig’s list (go figure). Next it’s a tour of Hack Manhattan, a hackerspace from which the screenshot above was pulled. We loved seeing the box labeled “abandoned projects” and were surprised to see the hackerspace is keeping bees. Are there any other spaces doing this? Before heading over to the Maker Faire [Ian] checks out some of the local shops. There’s a stop a Radio Shack, the Makerbot store where even the display cases are 3D printed, and finally a tour of some local component shops.

We’re always entertained by these world travelling videos. Here’s one he did in Seoul, South Korea.

Monetizing a hackerspace with a 3D printer store

Starting a hackerspace is easy, but maintaining it is a pain in the rear. Not only do you need to pay the gas, water, and electric bills, but you’ll also need to have enough members to keep the whole operation afloat. Deezmaker might have a solution to this problem: have a hackerspace double up as a 3D printing store.

Deezmaker is the creator of the Bukobot 3D printer seen at Maker Faire San Francisco and successfully funded on Kickstarter. The new store/hackerspace will sell Bukobot 3D printers (as well as other brands if another company wishes), filaments, Kapton tape, electronic parts, and other random electronic paraphernalia to people on the street.

Alongside the 3D printer store, Deezmaker will also be running a hackerspace for anyone who needs something printed, a work table, or even just the use of a few tools. The grand opening will be this Sunday, Sept 23, in Pasadena, CA.

We’re really liking the idea of a store/hackerspace, if only because Deezmaker’s store will provide a wonderful case study for anyone with a similar business plan. It would be very nice to have a an independent hackerstore in every city, selling everything from 3D printers to batteries and LEDs. Yes, it’s sounds like a throwback to the RadioShack of the 70s, but that doesn’t mean the idea couldn’t succeed today.

Hackerspace intro: Xin Che Jian in Shanghai


[Paul] wrote in to submit this video introduction to the Xin Che Jian hackerspace in Shanghai. It appears as though they have a fairly active space there, with several ongoing projects. They show off a range of things from an intelligent wireless power strip to aquaponics. The space seems to have the usual amenities such as project storage and a machine shop. The familiar sound of someone explaining that several of the tools are “almost working” reminds us that it is a small world, and we’re all pretty much the same.

Tank router defends your pets?

The guys over at Section9 Hackerspace in Springfield, Missouri just finished building this treaded robot. Despite the juxtaposition of the cat, it really doesn’t defend anything. The project is a reconnaissance robot controlled over the network with video feedback.

The team started off with some lofty goals. They wanted to the robot to be able to climb stairs and to feature a detachable flying portion in order to get a better look at hard to reach places. Cost and complexity are cited as the reasons they ditched the idea of the flyer. The rest of the features came out much as planned. The motor controller for the treads is connected to an Arduino. This uses an Ethernet shield to connect to the WRT54G router which is also coming along for the ride. This seems a bit over-powered but it makes it easy to connect the webcam on the front (also via Ethernet).

On the software side they wrote an Android app. It controls the movement of the robot, as well as that of the camera. Of course you need to see where you’re going so they went the extra mile to include video from the webcam. Check out their show-and-tell video after the break.

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Hackerspace grand opening tonight in Portsmouth NH

The Port City hackerspace will be opening its doors tonight at 7pm for their grand opening party.  Judging from the pictures on their site, they’ve actually had the space long enough to get the tools set up and even do a few projects. This should be a good way to jump start the membership though.  Like most hackerspaces should, they are offering classes to people to educate them on the use of the tools and proper safety.

They have the usual full shop, but they also have a designated bike shop, where they will have several custom bikes on display. If you’re in the area, you should be sure to swing by and check it out. You are assured to at least get some delicious bar-b-que out of the deal.

Southwest Tour: Fablab in Tulsa Oklahoma

We passed through Tulsa Oklahoma the first day we were traveling, but it was very early in the morning, so we skipped the Fablab. On the way home though, the timing was perfect for a quick visit.  [Blixa] was happy to show me around and explain how the fablab works.

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Back up the band with some RGB stage lights

Fresh off the 72-hour madness of the Red Bull Creation contest some of the folks a North Street Labs took on a stage lighting project. It’s for a local performing venue that just opened up, and despite the time crunch the team pulled off another great build.

Sixteen meters of LED strip make the electronics for the project a whole lot easier. The strips run up the center of a cabinets built as stand-alone columns which will end up at the back of the stage. Each cabinet has its own 5V 4A power supply (note the burnout issues they mention when using cheap eBay PSUs). Each column has its own Arduino Uno driving the LEDs, with an RS485 shield to connect back to a main Arduino Mega 2560 controller. It uses a PSX controller to switch between different lighting modes.

The seven towers boasting 688 LEDs isn’t all that’s shedding light on the show. There’s also about 300 feet of EL wire at work.

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