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MaKey MaKey Apple Piano [code]

Makey Makey Apple Piano

I’m one of those people who say “I’ll publish that code later!” and then I get busy with other projects and never publish the code, so here’s me publishing the code.

So back in January I built the MaKey MaKey Apple Piano for one of Art Milwaukee‘s events that the Milwaukee Makerspace was involved in. And yeah, here’s the code!

MakeyPlayer

I’ve provided the Processing sketch and related data files, as well as full applications (for multiple platforms) for those who don’t want to mess around with compiling sketches, and just want to download and run an application for their MaKey MaKey.

Could it use improvements? Of course it could! Feel free to make it better, and if you do, please share your changes with others.

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A Coat Hook

Coat Hook

I recently (temporarily) changed offices at work, and with the new office came a new door, and this door has no coat hook! Because I couldn’t drill a hole in the door or mar the surface in any way, I needed an “over the door” style coat hook. Ah yes, the classic coat hook. Adrian Bowyer made one back in 2008, so I decided it was time to make my own.

OpenSCAD Coat Hook

I took a quick measurement of the door to determine how wide it was. I then fired up OpenSCAD and made a bunch of “cubes” of various shapes and sizes, some rotated 90 degrees, but all in all, a pretty simple OpenSCAD model. One thing I did do was add in the “door” based on the measurement I took, so I could see how the coat hook would fit around it.

Plate Coat Hook

After compiling it in OpenSCAD, I exported the STL file, and at this point I usually use Gary Hodgson’s STL Viewer to take a quick look at the file and make sure it’s oriented correctly.

G-code Coat Hook

After viewing the STL file, I use Slic3r to generate the G-code, but hey, let’s check out the G-code while we’re at it! Joe Walnes wrote a great web-based G-code viewer you can use online, or download and run locally. If you want a somewhat improved version, Jeremy Herrman’s got a viewer and some code for you.

Working Coat Hook

Well, after all that generating files, and viewing files, I printed the file. It worked out well! Here’s a terrible photo of it preventing my shirt from falling on the floor. Success! The magic of a home 3D printer pays off again.

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Make: Lego and Arduino Projects

Make: Lego and Arduino Projects

Leave it to me to forget things! I forgot to mention that my Arc-O-Matic was mentioned in the book Make: Lego and Arduino Projects. Get to chapter 3 and you’ll see one of my photos.

I should mention that I have not actually read the whole book, I ended up loaning it to someone who is way more into LEGO and Arduino stuff than I am, but if you want more info on it, WIRED has a nice write-up, and you can buy it from Amazon or directly from O’Reilly.

John Baichtal (one of the authors) has another book in the works which I’ll have a hand in, but we’ll save that story for another time.

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Flying Cars and Robots

Flying Car MKE

Remember Milwaukee Innovation Week? Sure you do, or maybe you don’t, it doesn’t matter because it’s been replaced/re-branded as Flying Car Milwaukee!

June is a super-hectic month around the RasterWeb! World Headquarters, and even more so in 2013, but that didn’t stop me from submitting a proposal to their Great Robot Showdown contest, and yeah, I got accepted, and I’ve got less than a month to finish building the robot I’ve proposed. There’s nothing like a deadline to get things done!

So besides getting a presentation ready for WordCamp Milwaukee that weekend, I’ll be attending the Flying Car Gala on Friday, June 7th at the Potawatomi Expo Center to show off my creation and hope it doesn’t burst into flames before the prizes are handed out.

If you’re not into robots but enjoy fashion, design, or film, there’ll be plenty of those things as well. (But seriously, if you’re not into robots, why are you even reading this!?)

There’s a ton of other stuff going on during the week, just check the events page. If you’re interested in making the world a better place, join out friends at Bucketworks for the BuildHealth Workshop. And if you happen to get in on the Innovation Factory Tours you may see me building the aforementioned robot at Milwaukee Makerspace.

(June’s my month… you may not be able to avoid me! Mwuhahaha!)

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Your 3D Printed Future

Robohand

While some people focus on 3D printing guns, other are making the world a better place, improving the lives of those around them, and just generally being completely freaking awesome.

Robohand is focused on developing open-source designs for mechanical finger prosthetics. Thanks to Makerbot generously providing two Replicator 2’s to the project, we are now exploring the ways in which 3D printing can be applied to our efforts!

Check it out on Thingiverse, or the MakerBot blog. And you, 3D printer operator, don’t be afraid of making the world a better place, or at least trying. Using technology to improve lives is a good thing. We need more of that in the world.