It wouldn't be DEtroit without vats of molten metal as bright as the sun pouring and spitting into molds. Poet, painter, photographer, sculptor (AND bartender), Joe Sandor, is providing the hellfire at this weekend's Maker Faire Detroit. Joe's actually from Chicago, but we won't hold that against him. Tonight, at 7pm, he'll be at the Lost Arts stage, doing a live iron pour using creations from the earlier Scratch Block Workshop. Fresh-baked cannonballs on sale, too!

Joe has a great piece in the latest issue of MAKE, called "Slag Social: The art and community of the DIY iron pour." From the pictures in the article, it looks like a lot of fun, really hot, sweaty fun.

Chicago Crucible

From the pages of MAKE:

MAKE Volume 23, Gadgets This special issue is devoted to machines that do delightful and surprising things. In it, we show you how to make a miniature electronic Whac-a-Mole arcade game, a tiny but mighty see-through audio amp, a magic mirror that contains an animated soothsayer, a self-balancing one-wheeled Gyrocar, and the Most Useless Machine (as seen on The Colbert Report!). Plus we go behind the scenes and show you how Intellectual Ventures made their incredible laser targeting mosquito zapper -- yes, it's real, and you wish you had one for your patio barbecue. All this and much, much more.

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One of my favorite features of Maker Faire Bay Area was the Maker Shed soldering merit badges and the Learn to Solder tent. It looks like it's a similar hit in Detroit. Marc de Vinck shares this great Maker Faire moment:

Marc (asking a kid): "Did you learn to solder? Was it fun?" Kid: "Yeah! Mom, I want solder for Christmas."

Hear that, Santa? The kids want solder for Christmas!

Do YOU know how to solder yet? It's a lot easier than you think. We have tons of resources here on MAKE to get you started. Here are a few:

Teach your family to solder MAKEcation series Soldering Tutorial - Make Video Podcast Soldering Tutorial PDF

  In the Maker Shed:

Learn to Solder kit Comes with a 30w soldering iron, wire cutters, and a soldering practice kit.

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The first ever Maker Faire Detroit is taking place next weekend (July 31 and August 1) at The Henry Ford, and the more I read about the over 250 makers who will be displaying their creations, the more I'm amazed at the variety of projects that will be there. Arts, engineering, robotics, food, you name it. Today we chat with Steve Frey, the brains behind Dr. Frybrain's biodegradable Pumpkin Embalmer.

1. Tell us about the project(s) you're bringing to Maker Faire. Pumpkin Embalmer is a chemical formula that extends the life of carved pumpkins, aka jack-o'-lanterns. Normally pumpkins only last a day or two before they start to rot. Why? Decay bacteria need two things: water and food. A pumpkin is 90% water, and the other 10% is food! The bacteria also need an acidic environment (pH below 7), and pumpkins are naturally acidic. Pumpkins will also start to shrivel as they naturally lose their moisture.

When a carved pumpkin is soaked in the Pumpkin Embalmer solution, the natural moisture is drawn out of the flesh of the pumpkin, and it is replaced with a mineral. This starves the bacteria of their water source, and at the same time helps to retain the pumpkin's natural shape. The solution also has a high pH level (basic), which raises the pH of the pumpkin, thus retarding the growth of the bacteria.

1. How did you hear about Maker Faire and why did you decide to participate? A friend of ours is actively involved in the DIY "Home Haunt" scene, and suggested we attend. We are hoping to find a company or individual interested in licensing our chemical formula (U.S. patent pending) and registered trademark, to produce and distribute the product.

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KRON Channel 4 (Bay Area ABC affiliate) ran a nice segment yesterday on Maker Faire Bay Area 2010. Check it out.

Best of the Bay

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Only two weeks left until the first-ever Maker Faire Detroit takes place at The Henry Ford, on July 31 and August 1! It's exciting learning about all the creative projects and people coming to the Faire. Today we chat with Nicholas Reed of the Limitless Plotter project.

1. Tell us about the project(s) you're bringing to Maker Faire. For the past seven months, fellow KU alum Tim Williams and I have put our minds to building a platform for blending digital and physical art. Our project is all about having the mobile ability to put almost any type of media on almost any surface and utilizing computer control for precision and complexity. We've started by testing with dry erase markers on white boards, and have now successfully implemented an airbrush, which allows nearly all surfaces to be marked on. In the infant stages we spent a great deal of time researching CNC kits and how they operated, so that we could rebuild one to fit our needs. Our design uses "over the counter" supplies (besides the CNC kit) to create an expandable system that is customizable for different canvas sizes.

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Just got this message from Maker Faire Director Sherry Huss:

The Mouse Trap Truck is heading East.... with Detroit and New York Maker Faire on the side.....

How fun is that? I never thought I'd end up in the circus, but there ya go. There's a maker born every minute!

Maker Faire Detroit Maker Faire New York

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There are just two weeks left before the first-ever Maker Faire Detroit, taking place on July 31 and August 1 at The Henry Ford. Motor City is a Maker City, and it's exciting to see it all coming together. Among the creative projects coming to the Faire is the gloriously pedal-powered BigDog (pictured above), which looks like the Hennepin Crawler's slick Midwestern cousin. We chatted with Tom Wilson, the maker behind BigDog.

1. Tell us about the project you're bringing to Maker Faire. A wonderfully impractical assemblage of bicycle, go-cart, and golf-cart pieces and parts, drainage pipe, steel tubing, and patio chairs. This four-wheel vehicle allows four passengers to travel in minor discomfort at speeds approaching a brisk walk, for relatively short distances, on completely flat terrain.

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The countdown is on to Maker Faire Detroit. 19 days and counting. A new Faire mailing went out today. You can see it here. Advance tickets are still available at discounted prices through midnight (ET) on 7/15. See the ticket ordering page for details.

Here are some of the Faire highlights:

Maker Faire Detroit is a great gathering of makers from all over the Midwest. Bringing a mix of unique talent and wonder, blending fan favorites like the Life-Size Mousetrap with new makers like Matthew Switlik from i3 Detroit and his Arduino Powered Skeeball Machine, Electric Motorscooters from Erik Kauppi, and Rick Chownyk with his Jumbo Etch-a-Sketch.

Of course, there will be rockets and robots, DIY science, hands-on play areas, and activities for all ages. Crafting with TNNA, and the creative craft folks from Handmade Detroit. Don't miss new cool tools, such as the Limitless Plotter by Nicholas Reed from the University of Kansas, or the Solor Vox by Eric Strebel in the Michigan Made space of Maker Faire Detroit.

Attractions abound: Eepybird.com will be there with their Coke Zero and Mentos Fountains shows, as will the Cyclecide bike rodeo and human powered carnival, both Maker Faire favorites not to be missed! Deus Ex Machina, a large scale swing that is set with a computer controlled interactive water plane is a must-see.

The Life-Size Mouse Trap will also be in Detroit. Life-Size Mousetrap is the classic tabletop board game turned into a life-size spectacle! A colorful assemblage of kinetic sculptures fantastically handcrafted into a giant 25 ton Rube Goldberg machine!

We are in the Detroit, and in the spirit of Motor City, Maker Faire Detroit will have a host of hands-on car activities. Check out the Hack A Race Track for lots of fun, like Power Racing and more. Or the MINI-Z Motor Race area. Plus art cars and so much more! Vroom Vroom!!

This is just a sampling of some of the makers and activities you'll see at Maker Faire Detroit.

Get out of your garage. Come out here to meet all those makers that Hail from the great state of Michigan.

See you in Detroit!

More: Maker Faire Detroit: Arduino Skeeball interview

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Here's the second episode of our favorite new show, Sylvia's Super-Awesome Maker Show. In this installment, the super-awesome Sylvia explores this year's Maker Faire Bay Area (and does projects she learned at the Faire!). Keep up the inspiring work, Sylvia!

Sylvia's Super-Awesome Maker Show: Episode 02 - Part 1, Maker Faire 2010

More: Sylvia's Super-Awesome Maker Show: Episode 01, DrawdioSee more Maker Faire coverage via our YouTube Maker Faire Playlist

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Here's the video of Adam Savage's wonderful talk at Maker Faire Bay Area 2010, captured by our friends at FORA.tv.

Adam Savage Presents Problem Solving: How I Do It -- Maker Faire

More: Adam Savage, at Maker Faire, talking on the importance of failure

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Attention Midwest makers! It's time to apply to show your stuff at Maker Faire Detroit! We have a lot of great applications, but we know many of you have been procrastinating or found out late, so get yourself over to the call for makers and show us what you make! The deadline has been extended to June 15th. While you're at it, you might become a fan of Maker Faire Detroit on Facebook.

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Ask any engineer what originally sparked their interest in technology, and almost universally the response will be a Hollywood film or TV robot — Star Wars’ R2-D2, the B9 robot from Lost in Space, or Short Circuit’s Johnny 5, to name a few. Engineers need a creative outlet too, and some pay homage to their inspirations by building elaborate reproductions. At this year’s Maker Faire, droid-builders had their own corner in the center hall, their work ranging from humble craft materials to ’bots surpassing their film counterparts in detail and workmanship.

Probably the most beloved film robot of all time would be R2-D2, and probably the best-known reproductions originate from the R2-D2 Builders Club, who’ve been profiled in Make and Servo magazines, among others. Every kid’s dreamed of building their own R2, perhaps from a wastepaper basket and scrap, but the club’s astromech droids are anything but kid stuff, with machined aluminum domes and intricate motor and sound systems. The club doesn’t sell robots — that would infringe on trademarks — but they do share techniques and component plans. The finished droids (are they ever really finished?) put in appearances at fan conventions and charity events.

Danger Will Robinson! Career inventor [Andrew Filo] has been engineering practical everyday items for three decades, but he cuts loose by bringing his early inspirations to life. His carefully-researched reproductions include an Apollo-era NASA spacesuit and a talking, walking…er, rolling…B9 robot.

Self-described recluse [ELS] is a builder and collector of film props and reproductions. Though he insists his Robby and B9 aren’t perfectly canon, you’d never know by looking; the detail and finish on these two was amazing. Robby is wearable, and periodically through the weekend he’d climb into the suit and entertain a new generation who otherwise might not be acquainted with this Hollywood classic.

[Matthew Ebisu] is obsessed with all things Pixar. As one of the younger makers exhibiting, [Matthew’s] materials may be simpler, but his enthusiasm more than fills the gap. He’s built — and launched — Carl Fredricksen’s house from Up in miniature form. It didn’t quite reach South America, but did net him a pen pal in Nevada. His Autopilot and Eve droids from Wall-E are more craft than tech, so his latest project, along with a gaggle of like-minded friends on his D.I.Y. Pixar fan site, is to develop a working Wall-E robot. So readers — is there a favorite Hollywood ’bot to credit for your passion for this hacking madness? And have you built one yet? A HAL-9000 in your kitchen? Tell us about it in the comments, or if you have a build log posted online somewhere, drop us a link at tips@hackaday.com.

I know we've done a lot of coverage of the Raygun Gothic Rocketship, but it really is an astounding piece and we were thrilled to have it as the centerpiece of the Faire. And, as this mini-documentary shows, it's really an amazing maker story, about a large community of some 60 people coming together to do something with no other motivations than to delight fellow earthlings and to express creativity and the power of collaboration and chutzpah.

More:Raygun Gothic Rocket replicas from Alan RorieThe Road to Maker Faire: How to launch a rocket...The Road to Maker Faire: Greetings Earthlings!Maker Faire: Interview with Raygun Gothic Rocketship crewHow-To: Assemble a Raygun Gothic RocketshipAlan Rorie is AlmostScientific

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Since the previously-posted stills can’t quite convey the chaos of last weekend’s Maker Faire, here’s some video from the event to help get you through hump day. It’s like three liters of Jolt Cola in a two liter bottle. One thing even video can’t adequately capture is our gratitude toward our readers at the show who took time to express their appreciation for the blog. You guys and gals rock our world. Thank you!

Wow, we had an awesome time showing off our project to hundreds of people at Maker Faire Bay Area 2010! Here's a short video showing some of the reactions we got when people put the headphones on and started making their own beats with beatseqr and steppa. We're just getting started, so keep an eye out for us at http://beatseqr.com/blog/

More: The Road From Maker Faire: Raven HannaThe Road to Maker Faire: How to launch a rocket...The Road to Maker Faire: Raven HannaThe Road to Maker Faire: beatseqrThe Road to Maker Faire: Rachel HospodarThe Road to Maker Faire: Greetings Earthlings!The Road to Maker Faire: TinyMeat preps for Maker Faire

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One of the more awesomely bizarre things that happened at this year's Maker Faire was the band OK Go performing onstage while inside of WaterBoy, BucketHead, and BubbleHead. These are three water-immersion devices created by Marque Cornblatt. WaterBoy is sort of a full-body water bladder a person climbs into with goggles and a breathing apparatus, and the other two just immerse your head. The band bravely decided to get into these crazed contraptions, and overcome any fears of drowning, and perform before a large crowd, without ever having been inside of them before. They had little more than a ten-minute rehearsal while immersed! The crazed, improvisational insanity of it all was palpable.

It was even decided to put goldfish into WaterBoy for lead singer Damian Kulash's time inside, which only added to the surrealism of it all. After the show, Maker Relations superconductor Kate Rowe, fearlessly volunteered to climb into the suit, in her jeans and a t-shit, to scoop out all of the fish to give out to kids at the Faire. As Dale Dougherty joked, his only fear was that they would refuse to change the water because Damian had been in it.

Here are some video highlights of OK Go and WaterBoy, and a link to a piece on PopSci on the making of a "floating head" costume.

How to Make a Floating Head Costume

More: OK Go Rube Goldberg video: meet the makers!OK Go Rube Goldberg machine interactive floor planBehind the scenes of OK Go's Rube Goldberg video at Ignite Los Angeles

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Photo: Billy Baque

Apparently there was some kind of giant rocketship at Maker Faire this year. Did anybody else notice this? I tend to tune everything else out when there's funnel cake around. We should probably put it in a more prominent location next time.

Anyhoo, if, like me, you were at the Faire and happened to miss the 40-foot-tall gleaming aluminum spaceship in the middle of the grounds, on the program, and on all the posters, don't fret: There are plenty of groovy photos and videos whooshing around the tubes, and if you find yourself unsatisfied by two-dimensional simulacra you could always purchase one of Raygun Gothic crewman Alan Rorie's kit models of the craft. He's got beautifully-printed pepakura for $13 and laser-cut plywood for $50.

More:The Road to Maker Faire: How to launch a rocket...Maker Faire: Interview with Raygun Gothic Rocketship crewHow-To: Assemble a Raygun Gothic RocketshipAlan Rorie is AlmostScientific

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Learn about the Team Bobcat Ford Fiesta caravan...

Team Bobcat and the Ford Fiesta caravan arrived at Maker Faire on Friday, concluding their long trek from Michigan to California. Since their class began only a few months ago, the team designed, developed, and field-tested a project of their own invention that took them on a journey both cross-country, and into the world of professional software development. Along they way, they learned about how to design interfaces for fast-moving vehicles (learning quite a bit about how their technology works in the field), tweaked their project to add handy features, and also managed to take some time to enjoy the experience of traveling across the country.

MAKE caught up with them as they stopped at Northwestern University in Illinois, University of Colorado in Boulder, Stanford University in California, and finally, Maker Faire!

Since arriving at the fairgrounds in San Mateo, the students and engineers have been busy demonstrating their projects to eager onlookers. They've also managed to spend some time taking in other exhibits. I had the chance to walk around with them, to see what they thought about the Faire:

Hanging out with a giant knitted giraffe in the Expo Hall

Learning how to turn a 3D joystick into a musical instrument

Checking out the MakerBot CupCake transformer!

We had a great time learning about DIY 3D printers, navigating through invisible audio mazes, and checking out bottle-headed sculptures. The group's favorite part of the Faire, however, was the workshops. Student Collin Hockey said he really enjoyed the introduction to soldering tutorial, and was looking forward to experimenting more with hardware in the future. The rest of the group was apparently off taking a more advanced surface-mount soldering class.

Ford engineer Joseph Rork, longtime MAKE fan and subscriber since Volume 01, was especially excited to be part of the Faire experience. He said that visitors who stopped by their display were overwhelmingly impressed with their project, especially when they found out that it was built using commodity hardware that was accessible to anyone. The only "problem" he had with the Faire was that it too much fun, and there were too many cool things to check out and to buy. Joseph said he would definitely have preferred a few extra days to be able to see everything.

MAKE really enjoyed being a part of American Journey 2.0. It's encouraging to see the interest that Ford has expressed in the maker movement, and if this project is any indication of the direction in which they're headed, it will be interesting to see where this journey ultimately takes us.

Learn about the Team Bobcat Ford Fiesta caravan...

More: American Journey 2.0: Team Bobcat hits the road American Journey 2.0: A visit to Northwestern University American Journey 2.0: AJtheFiesta takes Boulder American Journey 2.0: Cruising to Stanford

MAKE's coverage of American Journey 2.0 is sponsored by SYNC®

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Mashable put together a nice video of highlights from the Faire.

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Just when you think it couldn’t possibly get any bigger and crazier, they manage to outdo themselves again. The Bay Area Maker Faire wrapped up Sunday evening, but we have so many story leads that we’ll probably be busy until next year’s event. In the meantime, here’s just a tiny, random sampling of the countless delights that greeted visitors this past weekend.

Setup day was the only time we could get a clear shot of the Hermes space shuttle, [Morris Jarvis’] entry in the suborbital tourist space race.

Early Saturday morning, the line stretches to infinity and beyond.

At the other side of the fairgrounds, scads of locals took advantage of the free bike valet service and scored a $5 admission discount to boot. And this view shows only about half of the bikes present! We only spotted one recumbent parked out here, but quite a few inside as maker exhibits.

So much walking! This kid had the right idea, scooting around in luxury.

It’s not a Bay Area party until the original Doggie Diner heads show up!

Robots were everywhere this year. Of course the R2 Builders Club was on hand…

…but there were no Wookiees present to play chess against this robotic arm.

A row of Anybots, all ready to take up their overlord duties.

Our favorite giraffe joined the rave, replete with his new animatronic head.

The Mondo Spider, like its smaller biological inspiration, manages to be simultaneously fascinating and potentially deadly. It is, however, anything but silent.

Back outside, this MIDI-controlled pneumatic dinosaur alternately entertained and terrified children. We were hoping to witness a one-on-one battle against…

…Saphira, the fire-breathing dragon! Rar!

Nearby, [Haley Duke’s] Swamp Kirin puppet loomed over fairgoers. Kirin, we just discovered, appear to be mortal enemies of efficient JPEG compression.

[Todd Williams’] Land Shark is an animated EL wire-framed skeleton atop a large radio controlled car chassis — a great effect in the dark!

We seem to be on a bitey creature kick. Here, have a Velociraptor head popped out of a commercial ABS extrusion 3D printer.

We posted about the DIYLILCNC mill late last year. What struck us when finally seeing it in person is how it’s anything but li’l. This thing bullies RepRaps and takes their lunch money!

They were even making something in the Maker Shed store. What exactly? We’ll give you a hint: it’s printed with green ink on the back. Man, they got us good. Went in needing just one Parallax RFID reader, and somehow couldn’t leave before spending the equivalent GNP of Guam.

This is here just for blog cred.

Our hats are off — again — to SparkFun Electronics. These guys could’ve easily brought enough neat stuff to bankroll their retirement from this one show. Instead, they taught kids how to solder. How cool is that?

FPGA pr0n from Art Magnitude’s ORB v.2, a persistence-of-vision globe on a grand scale.

There was always a line waiting to play with Tangile interaction’s digital graffiti wall.

This way to the egress! If we’ve overlooked or glossed over your favorite subject or display, it may be that we’re expecting to cover it in more detail in the future. Keep your eyes peeled for more wild stuff here!