Spotted on the MAKE Flickr pool, this funky-fine Morse code straight key made with a Two Pence piece.
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Sew a cute Morse code key leg strap
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Morse code key made from a coin
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/09/morse_code_key_made_from_a_coin.html
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15 Hours, 5 Minutes ago | More »
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Citizen Science month
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/09/citizen_science_month.html
Citizen Scientists: Show us your Erlenmeyer flasks, your test tubes, your centrifuges, your stereomicroscopes, your mutant science experiments, yearning to be free. It's Citizen Science month here on MAKE, an opportunity for us to feature a lot of the science content from the magazine and here online, a chance for us to collaborate with people who are leading the charge on citizen science initiatives, and a chance for us to share some great science how-tos on Make: Projects.
If you're a maker doing citizen science ( or have a group doing science), have a science project, or have any desires for what you'd like to see us cover, please let us know. This is an exciting and growing area of making and we're looking forward to spending a month celebrating it.
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September 1 2010, 7:15pm | More »
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Open science group forming in Chicago
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/08/open_science_group_forming_in_chica.html
Sacha De'Angeli wrote in to share his plans to help organize an open science group in Chicago.I'm really interested in promoting the open science movement here in Chicago, so I'd like us all to start an Open Science Group: ChiOpenSci. First meeting will be on Sunday September 12 at 4pm at Pumping Station: One 3354 N. Elston Ave in Chicago.
Entrepreneurs, enthusiasts, researchers, and amateurs are all welcome! Read the Full Story » | More on MAKE » | Comments » | Read more articles in Science | Digg this!- Tags:
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August 22 2010, 2:00pm | More »
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TextTool: Secrets of the beehive
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/08/national_honey_bee_awareness_day.html
Princeton Architectural Press has done it again, producing a book that is as beautiful and tactile as it is thought-provoking and educational. BEE, by artist and photographer Rose-Lynn Fisher, is basically a photo gallery of scanning electron microscope photographs of bee anatomy. The pictures, ranging in magnification from 10x to 5000x, are stunning, and by themselves worth the price of admission ($29.95, BTW). But the deep captions that accompany each image offer fascinating insights into the alien world we're peering into and the day to day business of bees. I feel like I learned a lot about genus Apis, and got to ponder larger questions about the designs, forms, and functions of nature, while casually browsing gorgeous photos and brief, engaging text.
The project that resulted in this book began when Fisher realized that the 6,900 hexagonal lenses of the honeybee also resemble the structure of the honeycombs they build. Trying to discover what that relationship might mean sent her on this microscopic quest. She never answers this question overtly in the book; it's an ongoing, open question, I guess. But we're all the richer for her posing it and mounting the investigation. BEE should appeal to anybody interested in science and the natural world, structure, growth, and form, photography, and of course, bees. Oh, and book art — lovely, lovely book art.
Here's a slideshow of images from the book.
In Other Bee News:
August 21st is National Honey Bee Awareness Day. The idea is to raise awareness of the vital role that bees play in our environment and food supply and to promote beekeeping, as a hobby and industry. This year's theme is "Local Honey — Good For Bees, You, and the Environment." The site contains a listing of local beekeeping associations and a getting started in beekeeping checklist.More:
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See all of our bee coverage on MAKE
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August 16 2010, 6:00pm | More »
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Perseid meteor shower peaks tonight
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/08/perseid_meteor_shower_peaks_tonight.html
Perseid meteor shower peaks tonight Jillian @ Boston Herald writes -
Instead of staring at the TV late Thursday night, how about staring at the sky?
Stargazing is on the agenda for many people this week with the annual Perseid meteor shower reaching its peak late Thursday and into early Friday.
While some local events will provide access to telescopes, they’re unnecessary during the shower -- anyone can catch the show, said David McDonald, director of education at the McAuliffe-Shepard Discovery Center in Concord, N.H..
"You never know where they’re going to appear," McDonald said. "When they do appear, they’re moving pretty quickly. Telescope views would be just happenstance, and very lucky."
The meteors are best viewed with the naked eye and from the ground. "Go outside, lie down," McDonald said. "Do not stand and cock your neck back."
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August 11 2010, 11:00pm | More »
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Math Monday: Geometric origami
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/08/math_monday_geometric_origami.html
By George Hart for the Museum of Mathematics
Each year I visit the annual Origami convention in New York City, and this year, as always, I was impressed by the wide range of works on display. The mathematical examples get more sophisticated each year. Here are just four examples to illustrate a range of folding styles.
The above is the symmetric compound of six pentagonal prisms, designed and folded by Daniel Kwan.
This hexagonal swirl tessellation was designed and then folded from one sheet of paper by Jon Tucker.
This pentagonal torus is a modular design assembled from a great many small folded units. It is designed by Heinz Strobl and folded by Faye Goldman.
And Brian Chan designed and folded this amazingly complex fractal from a single sheet of paper. It is a model of a Romanesco broccoli, true even to the Fibonacci numbers displayed in its phyllotaxis. There are eight spirals in one direction and thirteen in the other direction. Many books and internet resources are available if you want to start making your own mathematical origami.
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August 9 2010, 3:00pm | More »
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‘Beyond,’ the Solar System at Air and Space Museum
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/08/beyond_the_solar_system_at_air_and.html
I'm planning a DC trip soon and think this will be my first stop! Exhibition Review - ‘Beyond,’ the Solar System at Air and Space Museum @ NYTimes.com via NOTCOT. Have any DC-area makers seen this yet? Post up in the comments!
The images on view at a remarkable exhibition at the National Air and Space Museum here could well serve as inspirational space cards for this century. But they possess far greater power than those old naïve fantasies. They are vividly, compellingly real; they astonish and bewilder, luring the viewer into a state of wonder.
In “Beyond: Visions of Our Solar System” 148 photographs of moons and planets show these brave new worlds as extraordinary landscapes of mists, dunes, fissures and rocks. The exhibition has appeared in other, more modest incarnations (including as a traveling show), but this is its most complete form. The filmmaker, writer and photographer Michael Benson deserves much credit for the refinement of these images, but we need no technical understanding of their origins to be struck by what they portray.
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August 4 2010, 11:00pm | More »
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How-To: Extract DNA
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/07/how-to_extract_dna.html
The page below, from the Universe of Utah's Genetics Science Learning Center, shows you how easy it is to extract DNA strands from any living thing (but stay away from living things that might be pissed at you for liquefying a half a cup of them in a blender).
The rest of the Learn.Genetics site is very well done and has a number of interactive experiments and models.
How to Extract DNA from Anything Living
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Other DIY DNA coverage on MAKE
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July 28 2010, 12:38am | More »
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Nexus One/Arduino SmallSat satellite test launch video
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/07/nexus_onearduino_smallsat_satellite.html
photo: jurvetsonMatthew Reyes of NASA Ames sent word that the RocketMavericks launch event on Saturday in Nevada's Black Rock desert was a resounding success. Traveling 28K feet aboard James Dougherty's Intimidator-5 rocket was a payload consisting of a Nexus One/Arduino SmallSat. Matthew and his cohorts are championing the use of smartphone components to lower the cost of deploying a satellite and expect it to become even more affordable with every revision.
Civilian space exploration is starting to take off. In fact, MAKE: v24 will be our "DIY Space" issue, so if you're working on an interesting project you think we should see, feel free to post a link in the comments.
Here's a video with Matthew explaining the evolution of the SmallSat shot earlier this year at Maker Faire 2010:
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July 27 2010, 7:00am | More »
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Beautiful, unusual model engine runs, baffles experts
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/07/beautiful_unusual_model_engine_runs.html
Watch this video. If you're confused about how it works, check the diagram above.
If you're still confused, don't worry--you're in good company.
Nederlander Jan Ridders, who is something of a legend in the model engineering world, built what he calls his Thermo Pulse Mobile without really understanding how it works, basing his model solely on a YouTube video demonstrating another one in operation. At first it didn't work. Then...
After a lot of random experiments, which I shall not enumerate here because of their irrelevance, I almost gave up until I took a closer look at the video. I noticed a kind of restriction at the place were the brass cylinder was fixed in the glass tube... Because I hadn't the slightest idea how the restriction should look, I used numerous small brass cylindrical plugs from my scrap box, including those with and without all kinds of bores in them and other deformities. I started random experiments, putting all kinds of plugs in the glass tube at the place where it is fixed in the stand...
By far, most of the plugs didn't bring any positive effect, but with some of them the engine started to show some sign of life. I was pleasantly surprised and at the same time extremely astonished when I found one plug that caused the engine to keep running, although yet not fully reliable. Using the typical characteristics of this "reference plug" I made a new plug, adding step by step changes to the geometries of the reference plug. This was still a random way of working, but at least somewhat more systematic. Finally I succeed in making a restriction that allowed the engine to run reliably.
Even though they've now got a working model, Ridders and his fellow model engineers have been unable to come to a consensus explaining the thermodynamics.
If you're interested in this or any of Jan Ridders' engines, he will e-mail you high-resolution technical drawings for free upon request. Apart from this remarkable curiosity, Ridders' more traditional model engine work is not to be missed.
More:
- Measure the power and efficiency of your Stirling Engine
- Soda can Stirling engine
- Teacup Stirling engine
- Boyd's tin can Stirling hot air engines
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July 26 2010, 5:00pm | More »
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Incredible 35 minute video tour of the ISS
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/07/incredible_35_minute_video_tour_of.html
Incredible personal video tour of the International Space Station with Expedition 18 Commander Mike Fincke (January 2009). If you can't view the OGG file, it's on YouTube as well...
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July 21 2010, 11:00pm | More »
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Rogue engineer steals departmental copier, tears it apart for fun
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/07/rogue_engineer_steals_departmental.html
Bill Hammack is one part Mr. Wizard and one part James Burke. He's a professor of Chemical Engineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and his alter ego Engineer Guy has made over 300 public radio spots emphasizing the creative aspects of science and engineering. In this three minute video, Bill tears apart a photocopier and explains, with great wit and wisdom, how it works. Ten more videos are available at his site. I especially like the one about tantalum. [via Boing Boing]
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July 19 2010, 5:00pm | More »
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Seeing A Star In A New Light
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/07/seeing_a_star_in_a_new_light.html
Catching up on some past Science Friday podcasts I ventured over to their site and checked out this great video they put together...
NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO), launched in February, has started to send back data. The instruments are giving solar scientists an unprecedented look at the sun, says Dean Pesnell, SDO project scientist. The hope is to better understand how solar activity--solar flares, coronal mass ejections, coronal holes--is linked to the sun's magnetic field. (Credits: video, images courtesy of: SDO (NASA) and the AIA, EVE and NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio, music by SYNTHAR)
The sun has been in a relatively quiet period in recent years -- but astronomers say that quiet period is nearing an end. Solar activity tends to go in 11-year cycles. 2008 and 2009 saw unusually calm times on the sun, with little in the way of sunspots. The year 2013 should bring a peak of the solar cycle, with the potential for solar storms that could disrupt electronics here on Earth. We'll talk about solar weather and the upcoming solar storm season. Plus, NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory launched earlier this year, and is sending back amazing images and video of activity on the sun. We'll take a look.
DAY STAR.
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July 9 2010, 11:00pm | More »
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Solar system necklace - "Each bead represents 20 million miles"
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/07/solar_system_necklace_-_each_bead_r.html
\
Laura Cesari, aka Chain of Being, makes beaded models of the solar system that, by the way, can also be worn as necklaces. Her work was recently featured on the blog of Carl Sagan's Planetary Society:
Years ago, I discovered a particularly nice piece of agate in a friend's bead shop that reminded me of Jupiter, and created a "Jupiter necklace" with other beads orbiting around it like moons. In the Solar System design, I decided to "zoom out" and focus on using small beads to measure the proportional distances between the planets. It took some calculations, a few abstractions, and a couple of prototypes: the first version was 75 inches long, made with 7-millimeter tubular glass bugle beads, each bead representing about 20 million miles. This Solar System Necklace design seemed like a good way to translate the mind-boggling distances of space into something tangible, something that people can measure physically with familiar objects.
Laura will sell you a complete 75" necklace based on her original design for $75, a shorter 38" version for $55, a kit for $24.50, or just the pattern for $5.
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The Road From Maker Faire: Raven Hanna- Tags:
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July 3 2010, 10:00pm | More »
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How-To: Build a star-tracker for your camera
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/07/how-to_build_a_star-tracker_for_you.html
The best stellar photography requires long exposure times to capture the dimmer stars. The problem with long exposures of the night sky, of course, is that it moves. Or rather, it appears to move. So if you don't have some way of keeping your camera pointed at the same location over the course of the exposure, you get "trailing." Eric Chesak built this impressive star-tracking camera mount bracket and won a Design News contest back in March with it.
If you've got a clever idea for a gadget--and it doesn't have to be as complicated as Eric's star-tracker--why not enter it in our ongoing Gadget Freak Design Contest? The prizes are juicy--the big one awards $1000 cash and a storefront in Makers Market--and, between you, me, and the other hundred thousand people reading this, so far the pool of entrants, while impressive, is pretty slim. The deadline's coming up on July 13, so get cracking!
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July 2 2010, 12:00pm | More »
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How-To: Trap lightning in a block
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/06/how-to_trap_lightning_in_a_block.html
Science bad boy Theo Gray shows you how to create lightning bolts in a piece of acrylic. OK, so you need the juice of a five-million-volt particle accelerator to get the effect seen here (via the Kent State Neo Beam's Dynamitron):
With the Dynamitron - rented for the day - adjusted to around three million volts, it blasts electrons about halfway through half-inch-thick pieces of acrylic sheet. The plastic is a very good insulator, so it traps the electrons inside. Coming out of the machine, the blocks don't look any different, but they hold a hornet's nest of electrons desperate to get out.
Left alone, the electrons will stay trapped for hours, but a knock with a sharp point opens a path for them to make a quick escape. Electrons gather from all parts of the block, joining up to form larger and larger streams of electric current on their way toward the exit point. As the charge leaves, it heats up and damages the plastic along the branching trails it follows, leaving a permanent trace of its path. If you could see inside a thundercloud in the nanoseconds before a bolt of lightning emerged, you would see the same kind of pattern. The bolt doesn't just pop up fully formed; it has to gather charge from all over the cloud.But he also explains how to create a more low-impact version in "7 Mad Science Experiments You Can Do At Home But Probably Shouldn't," an excerpt from his highly recommended book, Theo Gray's Mad Science.
7 Mad Science Experiments You Can Do At Home But Probably Shouldn't
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In the Maker Shed:
Theo Gray's Mad Science
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June 30 2010, 7:00pm | More »
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"God particle" signal is simulated as sound
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/06/god_particle_signal_is_simulated_as.html
Pop over to the BBC site and have a listen to what the Higgs Boson particle "might" sound like... It sounds like Science Fiction music, go figure :)
Scientists have simulated the sounds set to be made by sub-atomic particles such as the Higgs boson when they are produced at the Large Hadron Collider. Their aim is to develop a means for physicists at Cern to "listen to the data" and pick out the Higgs particle if and when they finally detect it.
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June 27 2010, 6:30am | More »
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Music of the sun recorded by scientists
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/06/music_of_the_sun_recorded_by_scient.html
Music of the sun recorded by scientists @ Telegraph...
Astronomers at the University of Sheffield have managed to record for the first time the eerie musical harmonies produced by the magnetic field in the outer atmosphere of the sun. They found that huge magnetic loops that have been observed coiling away from the outer layer of the sun's atmosphere, known as coronal loops, vibrate like strings on a musical instrument. In other cases they behave more like soundwaves as they travel through a wind instrument.
Click through to see and hear the video. The RIAA has since issued a takedown notice and it appears the sun will go down later today. Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Science | Digg this!- Tags:
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June 23 2010, 11:00pm | More »
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Top 10 mechanical curiosities from the archives
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/06/mechanical_curiosities_from_the_arc.html
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June 21 2010, 5:00pm | More »
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Oloid-shaped gold bar
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/06/oloid-shaped_gold_bullion.html
This is a limited edition 1.000 kg solid gold bar from German designer Martin Saemmer. Its shape is mathematically interesting because, at least in its ideal form, it will "develop" its entire surface area when rolled. In other words, if you were to let it roll down an inclined plane covered with paint, its entire surface would be covered when it got to the bottom. It belongs to a class of shapes, all sharing this property, which can be characterized as the convex hull of two perpendicular circles or sectors on the same axis, which is a fancy way of describing the surface you'd get if you were to shrink-wrap two disks slotted together at right angles to one another. Oloids and sphericons are members of the same class, but each term implies a specific relationship between the radii of the two disks and the distance between their centers which this gold bar does not have. So "stretched oloid" is about the best I can do to describe it.
The familiar two-circle roller or wobbler toy (an example of which we showed you how to make make from two coins back in MAKE 15) is basically the same thing but without the "shrink-wrap."
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June 18 2010, 9:00am | More »
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Beautiful antique Heron's Fountain apparatus
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/06/beautiful_antique_herons_fountain_a.html
Heron's Fountain, aka Hero's Fountain (Wikipedia), is named for Hero of Alexandria, a 1st-century Greek mathematician and physicist who described it in his Pneumatica. It is a kind of hydraulic novelty, in which the action of falling water causes a stream of water to spurt up higher than its source, which is counterintuitive for many. This beautiful example dates from the late 1700s and is described in detail in the online gallery of the Museo Galileo in Florence. More:
- Science fair fun with Hero's Fountain
- How-to Tuesday: A look back at my builds from 2008
- Build: Heron's fountain
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June 16 2010, 11:52pm | More »
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LOFAR - Is now online
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/06/lofar_-_is_now_online.html
LOFAR - One of the biggest radio telescopes is now online... and powered by a "Blue Gene" - via sB.
LOFAR started as a new and innovative effort to force a breakthrough in sensitivity for astronomical observations at radio-frequencies below 250 MHz. The LOw Frequency ARray is a multi-purpose sensor array. Its main application is astronomy at low frequencies (10-250 MHz) but also has geophysical and agricultural applications. Its heart is currently being assembled in the Northeast of the Netherlands and spreads over the whole country and over whole Europe.
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June 14 2010, 11:00pm | More »
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My 10 favorite mechanical animations from Wikipedia
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/06/my_10_favorite_mechanical_animation.html
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June 14 2010, 5:00pm | More »
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Gear exotica from the archives of Make: Online - Top 10 posts
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/06/gear_exotica_from_the_archives_of_m.html
#10
How-To: Working gears from junk mail
#9
#8
TriGears - 3D printed puzzle co-created by BitTorrent inventor
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June 11 2010, 9:00am | More »
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Great microbiologists, a documentary done in Lego
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/06/great_microbiologists_a_documentary.html
I must have been sleeping at my keyboard, because I completely missed this 2003 documentary, Great Microbiologists. It was created by Josh Leasure to commemorate a microbiologist friend's graduation from Colorado State University.
My favorite part is where the minifigs demonstrate the delicate task of adjusting a microscope using a hammer. Science! [via boingboing]
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June 6 2010, 5:00pm | More »
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The Coke Zero and Mentos Rocket Car
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/06/the_coke_zero_and_mentos_rocket_car.html
One of the hands-down favorite, perennial attractions at Maker Faire is the "Diet Coke and Mentos guys," aka Fritz Grobe and Stephen Voltz, aka EepyBird. Huge crowds excitedly gather to watch explosive geysers of carbonated combustion and to be showered with plumes of sticky sugar-water (which must be so much fun to wear around the Faire for the rest of the day).
Fritz and Stephen are always looking to up the ante, to see what else they can do with the combustive power of the "nucleation" that occurs when you combine the CO2 gas of soda with the unique sugar-coated surface of the Mentos (which forms "nucleation sites," nooks and crannies that cause the rapid formation of bubbles and a resulting foam that can be directed into a jet).
In this video, they show off their latest wacky stunt, turning a specially-built trike, some PVC pipe, 108 2-liter bottles of soda and 648 Mentos tablets into a rocket car.
On their site, they have a 3D version of the video, if you have the glasses (or want to make your own).
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The Coke Zero & Mentos Rocket Car (2-D version)
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June 4 2010, 6:00pm | More »
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Building an electromagnetically-assisted pendulum
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/06/electromagnetic_pendulum.html
For an upcoming clock project, Stephen Hobley is experimenting with an electromagnetic pendulum. The goal is to keep a pendulum swinging at a constant speed, in order to use it as a timing reference. By adding a permanent magnet to the bottom of a pendulum, and placing a coil of wire at the bottom of the pendulum's path, he is able to use the coil both to sense the motion of the pendulum, and to give it an electromagnetic boost every cycle to keep it swinging.
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June 1 2010, 9:00pm | More »
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Physical sciences and mechanics month
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/06/physical_sciences_and_mechanics_mon.html
The June theme for Make: Online is "Physical Science and Mechanics." Physical science is a broadly used term that can be applied to the study of any non-living systems and how they interact, from the foundational physical laws of energy, matter, and force to the basic principles of simple machines (lever, pulley, inclined plane, wedge, screw, gear). The term is also applied to chemistry and Earth sciences, and from there, it becomes leaky with the living, the biological. For our coverage, we'll stick to it as it applies to simple machines, basic laws of physics, and how they become the complex mechanical systems that surrounds us.Now you may think that such coverage is a little rudimentary for MAKE, the sort of foundational knowledge we all should have long-ago absorbed in grade school. But I think that's part of the problem. Understanding these basics is something that some folks may not have paid much attention to in school, but now they've become makers and they have holes in their knowledge, gaps they may be too embarrassed to admit to. Understanding basic physical properties, simple machines, basic mechanics can go a long way toward being able to understand, troubleshoot, design, and build more complex machines.
I suspected that Make: Electronics was likely to be a big success because I knew there was a dearth of clear, well-organized, plain English content explaining the rudimentary principles of electronics so that mortals could understand them. Similarly, I think a lot of people don't know, for instance, how gear trains work and how to figure out gear ratios for building a vehicle drive train, or how to effectively use a block and tackle to safely move a load, or how stresses, load-bearing, friction, pressure, and other forces effect the integrity of objects. These are the sorts of mechanical concepts and skills every maker should know.
We're looking forward to seeing how we can cover all of this in a fun, creative way, from talking to kinetic sculptors, to rounding up some of the best physical science content we've published previously (here and in the magazine), to original feature articles covering various aspects of physical science and mechanics.
As always, we'd love your input. If there's something you'd like for us to cover, or you have some special knowledge in this area, or if there are any key resources, tutorials, etc. that you think we should include, please send them along. Thanks!
Table of simple mechanisms, from Chambers' Cyclopedia, 1728.
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June 1 2010, 6:00pm | More »
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Morphologica Laser-Cut Science Geek Jewelry
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/05/morphologica_laser-cut_science_geek.html
Based in Sydney, Australia, the talented crafter behind Morphologica is currently finishing up a PhD in neuroscience. Inspired by the beauty of science, offerings include the DNA piece shown above as well as dendrites, neurons, and fancy, scrolling "Geek" and "Nerd" necklaces.
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May 27 2010, 9:00pm | More »
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Math Monday: Nailbanger's Nightmare
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/05/math_monday_nailbangers_nightmare.html
By George Hart for the Museum of Mathematics
In 1995, I designed this hypothetical construction and posted a computer rendering of it online. It is called "Nailbanger's Nightmare" because I thought it was far more complex than any carpenter would ever want to make.
After fifteen years, I was surprised to receive an email from Thomas Guethner of Trostberg, Germany, showing me that he has constructed a physical version of the structure. There are 480 wooden struts (60 in each of 8 slightly different lengths) all held together with 960 screws. The result is half a meter in diameter.
Thomas tells me "I want to thank you very much for this fantastic idea to get rid of some scrap wood."
Then I was surprised again when just a few weeks later I received images of another approach to making Nailbanger's Nightmare, this time from Canada. David Gunderson, at the University of Manitoba Mathematics Department, is developing an approach in which the struts have slots cut into their ends. The image shows how the sticks assemble with a friction fit.
More:
- Math Monday: Recycling soda bottles into icosahedra
- Math Monday: Two-layer geodesic spheres
- Math Monday: What to make with golf balls?
- Math Monday: Knitted cellular automaton tea cosy
- Math Monday: Whittling links and knots
- Math Monday: Magnet constructions
- Math Monday: Hexagonal stick arrangements
- Math Monday: Paper plate geometry
- Math Monday: 3D Hilbert curve from plumbing supplies
- Math Monday: Math-play with your food
- Math Monday: Mathematical art in the lava
- Math Monday: Balloon polyhedra
- Math Monday: Sierpinski tetrahedron
- Math Monday: Skewer hyperboloid
- Math Monday: Morton Bradley sculpture
- Math Monday: Tetraxis puzzle
- Math Monday: Giant burr puzzles
- Math Monday: Fractal polyhedra clusters
- Math Monday: Giant SOMA puzzle
- Math Monday: Tie your bagel in a knot!
- Math Monday: Playing card constructions
- Introducing "Math Monday"
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May 24 2010, 3:01pm | More »
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I posted to blog.makezine.com
Measure the power and efficiency of your Stirling Engine
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/05/measure_the_power_and_efficiency_of.html
Doug Conner of Atascadero, CA wrote in with his technique for testing Stirling Engines.
I'm running this engine from the heat of a 70W light bulb in the video, but It also runs well from the heat of two candles. Using higher heat sources it puts out over 1.5 watts. I need to redesign the engine so that it can run faster than the current limit of about 240 rpm to achieve higher power.
More:
- In the Maker Shed: Gakken Stirling engine kit
- How-To Tuesday: Teacup Stirling engine
- Soda can Stirling engine
- Taking a Stirling engine out for a cruise
- Stirling engine car
- Tags:
- science
May 20 2010, 3:00pm | More »
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I posted to blog.makezine.com
Math Monday: Two-layer geodesic spheres
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/05/math_monday_two-layer_geodesic_sphe.html
By George Hart for the Museum of Mathematics
This four inch diameter ball is a two-layer geodesic sphere. It has an outer layer of triangles connected with an inner layer of pentagons and hexagons, which is the structure of geodesic domes such as the Montreal Expo67 dome. The above design is unique, however, in that it is chiral, meaning it is different from its mirror image. If you have access to a 3D printing machine, you can build a copy of this structure from the .STL file available here.
Without a 3D printer, you can still build complex two-layer domes from commercial plastic components, by following the instructions here.
More:
- Math Monday: What to make with golf balls?
- Math Monday: Knitted cellular automaton tea cosy
- Math Monday: Whittling links and knots
- Math Monday: Magnet constructions
- Math Monday: Hexagonal stick arrangements
- Math Monday: Paper plate geometry
- Math Monday: 3D Hilbert curve from plumbing supplies
- Math Monday: Math-play with your food
- Math Monday: Mathematical art in the lava
- Math Monday: Balloon polyhedra
- Math Monday: Sierpinski tetrahedron
- Math Monday: Skewer hyperboloid
- Math Monday: Morton Bradley sculpture
- Math Monday: Tetraxis puzzle
- Math Monday: Giant burr puzzles
- Math Monday: Fractal polyhedra clusters
- Math Monday: Giant SOMA puzzle
- Math Monday: Tie your bagel in a knot!
- Math Monday: Playing card constructions
- Introducing "Math Monday"
- Tags:
- science
May 10 2010, 3:00pm | More »
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I posted to blog.makezine.com
Powdered rust reveals magstripe data
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/05/powdered_rust_reveals_magstripe_dat.html
Very cool trick from anaglyph: Apply powdered iron oxide to the magnetic stripe on a swipe card to visualize the encoded data. [via Boing Boing]
More:
- EMSL on magnetic fields
- Magnetic stripe card spoofer
- HOW TO - Decode your drivers license barcodes
- HOW TO - Read postal bar codes
- Build a magstripe reader from scratch
- Sploitcast - Emulating magnetic cards...
- Turning your mobile phone into a magnetic stripe reader
- Tags:
- science
May 9 2010, 10:27pm | More »
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I posted to blog.makezine.com
DIY nanotechnology: Make magnetite nanocrystals!
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/05/open_source_nanotechnology_make_mag.html
The folks over at OSnano are working to make nanotechnology to the home laboratory. Their first project is a guide to fabricating your own Magnetite Nanocrystals:
Why? Magnetite Nanocrystals are good for removing arsenic from water. Based on recent advances in nanotechnology, it's now possible to make regular magnetite nanocrystals as small as 20-100nm, and to remove them from solution using a handheld magnet. Arsenic poisoning is a huge problem in Southeast Asia, especially in Bangladesh, and in various other parts of the world. Our project opens up the process for making magnetite and encourages you to experiment with it, contribute to it, and improve it.
Looks pretty excellent, however it requires a TEM to verify the results. Anyone have a homebrew one of those (it should be totally possible...)? [thanks, Heath!]
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May 7 2010, 1:00pm | More »
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I posted to blog.makezine.com
How-To: Build a Peltier-cooled cloud chamber
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/05/how-to_build_a_peltier-cooled_cloud.html
Rich Olson has a posted about his Peltier cooler based cloud chamber. He's tested Americium, Carnotite, and Autunite samples in it.
Peltier Cooler Based Cloud ChamberMore:
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May 7 2010, 12:00am | More »
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I posted to blog.makezine.com
Open source satellites at Machine Project, Sunday April 25th
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/04/open_source_satellites_at_machine_p.html
The folks at Machine Project (Los Angeles, CA) sent us word on this presentation that's happening tomorrow:
After three years of research and one year of experience as a satellite engineer, Song Hojun has found that it is possible to launch and operate a personal satellite at a fairly reasonable price. In addition, he has for the past five years been exploring ways to integrate the concept of a personal satellite project into cultural contexts and into his artistic practice.
All the satellite-related systems (except for the rocket to launch it) are DIY programs -- designed so that regular people may also have the chance of developing and eventually launching their own.Join us (last minute!) this Sunday April 25th at 5pm for a presentation by Song, who will have his satellite with him for showing.
For the people who want to study more before they come, they can download Song's book from Google Books here.
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Open Source Satellite Initiative- Tags:
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April 25 2010, 12:15am | More »
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I posted to blog.makezine.com
Happy Birthday, Hubble telescope!
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/04/happy_birthday_hubble_telescope.html
Hubble turns twenty today. The orbiting space telescopes -- they grow up so fast. One day, it can barely focus its little lens, and seemingly, the next, it's exploring dark energy (let's call it its Goth phase). Happy birthday, Hubble. Spaceship Earth is so proud of you.
NASA writes on its Hubble page:
Space shuttle Discovery roared into orbit April 24, 1990, with a most precious cargo, NASA's Hubble Space Telescope. In the two decades since, teams of astronauts working from other shuttles repaired the orbiting eye on the universe and extended its abilities far beyond what was thought possible for longer than many thought realistic.
Hubble, named for groundbreaking astronomer Edwin Hubble, repaid the commitment with some of the most dazzling images the world has seen, along with fresh data that answered a wealth of questions and led to many new ones. The telescope's observations allowed astronomers to set the age of the universe at about 13.7 billion years with a high degree of certainty.
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How-To: Build a model Hubble Space Telescope- Tags:
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April 24 2010, 7:00pm | More »
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Distributed earthquake monitoring using laptop accelerometers
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/04/distributed_earthquake_monitoring_u.html
Kind of like SETI@home, but for collecting data instead of processing it. From NPR.org:
Newer models of laptops manufactured by companies like Apple and Lenovo contain accelerometers -- motion sensors meant to detect whether the computer has been dropped. If the computer falls, the hard drive will automatically switch off to protect the user's data.
"As soon as I knew there were these low-cost sensors inside these accelerometers, I thought it would be perfect to use them to network together and actually record earthquakes," says geoscientist Elizabeth Cochran of the University of California, Riverside.
So a few years ago, Cochran got in touch with Jesse Lawrence, a colleague at Stanford. They whipped up a program called the Quake-Catcher Network. It's a free download that runs silently in the background, collecting data from the computer's accelerometer and waiting to detect an earthquake.
Laptop accelerometers aren't as sensitive as professional-grade seismometers, so they can only pick up tremors of about magnitude 4.0 and above. But when a laptop does sense a tremor, it'll ping the researchers' server. "And when our server receives a bunch of those, we then say, 'This is a likely earthquake,' " Lawrence says.
Folks who don't have laptops with accelerometers and still want to participate can purchase a USB sensor for use at their desktop computers. A lot of these, reportedly, are being installed in public schools.
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April 18 2010, 10:00pm | More »
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I posted to blog.makezine.com
Charles Platt at Space Access '10
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/04/charles_platt_at_space_access_10.html
MAKE Contributing Editor (and author of Make: Electronics) Charles Platt just filed this little report from the commercial space conference he's covering for us. -- Gareth
The Lynx suborbital spaceplane from XCOR
I'm attending the Space Access '10 conference in Phoenix, Arizona, with the intention of writing about some particularly exciting ventures for a future DIY Space issue of MAKE. It's a pivotal time in this field. In the words of Jeff Greason, of XCOR, "I'm thrilled and terrified by the magnitude of the opportunity facing the US private space business." XCOR is already selling rides on its Lynx suborbital spaceplane for $95,000 (a $20,000 down payment required), which is considerably cheaper than Virgin Galactic. I think there's no doubt that the next step for Lynx will be, eventually, to offer orbital flights.This year, the Obama administration canceled Ares, NASA's last significant manned project (which had been initiated by George W. Bush). NASA has been directed to work with private companies, forcing it to take tiny startups more seriously. From the point of view of MAKE readers, rocketry is an exciting field, since almost all the independent companies have been created by people who were active originally in the amateur community.
Tim Pickens working on a 4000 pound thrust engine. (Image from his website)
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In a few minutes, I'll be listening to a presentation by Paul Breed, of Unreasonable Rocket. Breed's favorite aphorism seems to be: "Reasonable people adapt themselves to the world. Unreasonable people attempt to adapt the world to themselves." No X Prize for guessing which camp he's in. Following him this afternoon will be Tim Pickens, who entertains himself by building gadgets such as a rocket-powered pickup truck and a rocket-powered bicycle (for his daughter), but managed to sell his startup company, Orion, to a military contractor named Dynetics (which plans to use his designs to put small payloads
into orbit). -- Charles Platt- Tags:
- science
April 10 2010, 5:30pm | More »
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Owl nest web cam
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/04/owl_nest_web_cam.html
I lived in a rental years ago that had a water tower on the property. Each year barn owls nested in the eaves of the water tower, and each year my husband and I spent many evenings sitting nearby watching them. We saw babies learn to fly, mother and father swoop in and out with food, and could always see the mother and babes sleeping during the day.
Enter The Owl Box. We can now watch the life cycle of a barn owl family in a much more up close and personal manner.
Word on the interwebs is that two years ago Carlos Royal, a retired developer in San Marcos, Calif, built an owl box fitted with a number of video cameras. This January it was occupied by a pair of barn owls who produced 6 eggs. So far 4 of the eggs have hatched.
The dad owl delivers edibles in the evening and the mom and owlets eat on them throughout the day. There's an advisory on the site that states: This is a live feed of a Wild Barn Owl and family. Owls are carnivores. They hunt, kill and consume small rodents and other small animals. This is nature and contains scenes of the cycle of life which may occur at any time without warning.
There's also an on-going Twitter feed next to the live 24-hour video, but you have the option of going to full screen if you prefer your owl-watching without the commentary. And the maker of the box does live video chats with schools across the country. I love the internet! [Thanks, Diane!]
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April 9 2010, 7:00pm | More »
