Edinburgh Hacklab is pleased to announce the arrival of a rather special bit of equipment, a laser cutter. So what does one do with a laser cutter? It enables high resolution (0.0254mm/1000dpi) engraving and/or cutting of a wide range of materials including Acrylic, Crystal, Bamboo, Cloth, Fabric/Denim, Fiberglass, Glass, Laminated Plastic, Leather, Marble, Plastic, Paper, Rubber, Read more about Laser Cutter[…]
Come and join the Open Street Map meetup on the Tuesday 13th September 2011 at the Guildford Arms 7:00pm. Beside the chance to learn a lot from each other, we would like to discuss at that meeting further ideas for workshops and OSM events. Maybe you have already some some ideas of Open Street Map Read more about Open Street Map meetup[…]
Our inhouse PCB manufacture is improving, with 100% yield of a prototype non polar data and power connector. Results below. Had to print exposure mask at 110% so that the printer printed at the right size.
One of the cooler projects undertaken at the Hacklab has just come to fruition. Martin was working under the microscope for some time to create a masterpiece of minaturization: a wireless camera for insertion into a prosthetic eye (look Mom, no PCB!). The project seems to have caught the eye of the media, starting with Read more about Eyeborg goes mainstream[…]
Videos from presentations that took place on Sunday 17th July 2011 are now available. Spectral Robotics Part 1 Part 2 Robomotic Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 See the Original Post for more information. Apologies for the sound and picture quality, the lab was a little small for everyone so we used the space downstairs Read more about Videos from Sunday 17th July Talks[…]
Sacrificial wood clamps the piece so the cutter doesn't hit the steel vice. We have a new cutting lubricant in the bottom of the photo. A bottle of red helps the time pass.
Maria and I were working last week fabricating four identical complex pieces out of ABS plastic. Initially we though a lowish feed rate combined with a fast cutting speed would give the best results but actually that’s not true. ABS suffers from the material melting and reattaching tangental to the circular cutter, so the effect is that when you cut, you end up drawing frayed lines over the surface. This is particularly noticeable on 90 degree corners and in deep pockets (concave regions). The first fix we tried was running the same program a second time. This did improve the situation but not enough to give it a finished look.
As we approach the first birthday of Edinburgh Hacklab, it’s becoming clear that we’ve reached the limits of the space we’re currently occupying in Out Of The Blue. So it’s time for the Hacklab to take the next step – we’re looking for a new space. Broadly speaking, we’re looking for a minimum of 500 Read more about Pastures new?[…]
Make search go mega fast! O(log(n)) inserts and deletes on ordered lists, but with the twist that the original list before modification remains intact! Implemented by using path-copying as per “Making Data Structures Persistent” Driscoll, Sarnak, Sleator and Tarjan. PersistentRedBlackTreeSet This was quite tricky to implement, because you are not allowed parent pointers, so you Read more about A Java implementation of persistent red-black trees open sourced[…]
New Oldham couplings for the Z and Y axis have been fitted. The X axis has not been replaced but it has also never been broken. We have the bits to fit the X axis, we can do it next round of breakages :p Slop and backlash have been greatly reduced, and the machine sounds Read more about CNC working again[…]
Meet Arnie Android (rev0) !! Based on a desk toy from Dealextreme he as 2 servo driven arms,a buzzer two flashy eyes and a PIR sensor in the head. Those foolish enough to approach within 10 M of my desk can now be detected ans suitably “processed” by Arnie 😉 http://www.dealextreme.com/p/android-mini-collectible-series-action-figure-doll-android-09-yellow-51733 Designed by yours truly Read more about Android androids[…]