Category: Other

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Build Your Own Open Source 3D Printer

Build Your Own 3D Printer!

ONLY ONE WEEK LEFT TO SIGN-UP!

In collaboration with NextFabStudio, we are offering a state-of-the-art and upgraded RepRap printer kit and accompanying 3-day Build Workshop from August 26th-28th. The class cost is $998 ($1,200 for non-members) and includes EVERYTHING you need to get up and running, and more importantly, a fully calibrated and fine-tuned robot.

CLICK HERE FOR MORE INFO AND TO SIGN-UP

Check out the time-lapse video below from our first class in Baltimore where we got 10 printers up and running in 3 days.

We’ll help you and a friend or two to build your very own open-source RepRap 3D printer, which has more than 4x(!!) the build volume of it’s closest competitor, the MakerBot Thing-o-Matic. Note that you will save $202 off the class if you’re a member of Hive76 or NextFab Studio. Total class cost for members is only $998. This is a crazy cheap deal! You can’t even buy a MakerBot for that price, let alone learn how to assemble it and fine tune it correctly in just a weekend.

There’s lots of additional bells and whistles on this bot that you won’t find anywhere else: custom machined aluminum motor couplers, linear bearings, the latest RAMPS electronics, and much more!

Any questions or concerns? Click Here to contact Jordan.

First RepRap World Tour 3D Printing Class from jmil on Vimeo.

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Wide-Baseline Stereograms

Thanks to all who attended our first stereo photography class, it was a great turnout with several new faces! If you attended, here is some content that I just created that you can view using either the anaglyph glasses or parallel-viewing stereopticon that you received, or if you have been practicing up on your free-viewing, you can use the cross-eye method or “look-through” method (just set the 3D settings appropriately towards the bottom of the video on YouTube). I’ve created a slideshow of 3D images captured using wide baselines — in other words, the two photos making up each 3D picture were taken very far apart, much farther apart than the distance between a human’s eyes.

So, why wide-baseline? Well, the sense of depth from stereo vision is highly nonlinear, so we generally have exceptional depth perception up close (within a few inches or feet), but we are able to differentiate less and less as the objects get further away. In everyday life our depth perception due to binocular disparity is basically limited to around 20′ or so for most practical purposes. (This is why 3D pictures of landscapes are usually extremely boring and flat — the subject is too far away to make out the depth!) However, it is possible to overcome this limitation by moving the two cameras (one for each eye) farther apart. Some of these images were taken from airplane windows hundreds or thousands of feet apart, making it possible to discern depth between cloud layers many miles away. This tends to produce an effect that is similar to examining a miniature model of the subject up close.

Most of these 3D pictures were captured with the video camera on my phone while on a moving platform (train, car, airplane, etc), with the camera held very still up against the window and facing directly out. I would then open up two copies of the captured video side by side and use the cross-eye method to find two frames of the same subject that provide good depth. I would then copy those frames into Gimp, align the images and crop them down to produce a finished stereogram. It takes time and practice but it can produce some really cool results!

Boats outside Dave & Buster's on the Delaware River. Click to view entire slideshow
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Playtesters Wanted Tonight!

If anyone is up to the challenge tonight, I’ll be bringing in copies of “Crystal of Destiny,” a new and possibly even fun boardgame I’ve been working on with my friend Aaron. I would really love it if some curious folks would come join us for a few test rounds of play, and then give us your honest feedback. The game features scheming, spell casting, double-crossing, and some crazy insane patent-pending dice that you have to sign a waver just to look at. Each round should only take about 30 to 45 minutes, and I’ll repay your time with some cold beers and pizza.
Where: Hive76
When: Tonight at Open House (around 7:00)

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Phone “hacking” at News of the World

Whenever the word “hacking” shows up in the news, it usually means one of two things. It’s either some government or group breaking into the system of some other government or group, or more likely, someone didn’t change their weak password. Hackem

The recent fuss about News of the World in the UK is the latter, the stupid hack (besides bribing the police and other non-hacking crimes.) This “hack” is just taking advantage of one of two voicemail vulnerabilities. One way in is to punch in the default VM PIN for the carrier, which is sometimes the last 4 of the phone number. The other way is to spoof your caller ID to match the voicemail number so the system lets you in like this. PS: don’t hack voicemails.

We don’t want your personal voicemails to be stolen like this. That’s why this Wednesday for open house, we can help you stay safe. A member can help you navigate the menus on your phone and change or add some security. Or maybe this post just pushed you right now to change your pin to something other than 1478.

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Getting closer to an awesome laser

We are almost to laser time. Almost is this case is $2,908.70. That is the remaining cost for all of the hardware that a Lasersaur needs to move and cut and all that good stuff.

A real, complete Bill of Materials is located here. I took out stuff we already had or might be able to scrounge.

Pledgie is currently broken and now charges 3%, so if you would like to donate, there are tons of other ways to give us money: Paypal to hive76@gmail.com, Venmo to hive76, cash at open house, or buy some stuff and ship it to us!

I’m real excited to start etching and cutting stuff soon, but we can’t do it without your help!
As always, laser fund donations are redeemable at $1/minute. (That’s a good deal)

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BronzeBot: a 3D printer made of bronze

A few months ago Enrique Muyshondt (President of DesktopFab, aka Endeavour on IRC) gave us a set of Sells Mendel parts that he had cast for our work on various research projects at UPenn and here at Hive76. We slowly assembled it and got it running, and thanks to this past weekend’s RepRap World Tour stop in Baltimore, we have it running! In addition to 3D printing like a champ, we’re now using it to work on the firmware and customize printing scripts for tissue engineering research. We are grateful for the support!

The parts are cold cast bronze, this means Enrique painted several layers of bronze powder into his molds and then cast them with resin. What came out were the brown parts you see in the pictures and video below.

This 3D printer rocks. The RepRap 3D printing project still has a lot of rough edges, but that’s why we love it. We’ll have BronzeBot on exhibit at the next RepRapWorldTour in Baltimore, and then back in Philly in August to do it again.

Slideshow:

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Artemis and Star Trek DVD Watch this Saturday

Hey folks,

At this Saturday’s open house we’ll be playing Artemis Spaceship Bridge simulator, and then watching a few episodes of Star Trek (the original series) on behalf of the Philadelphia Star Trek Meetup Group. They’ve been having trouble finding a place to meet for their DVD nights, so we were happy to lend a hand. The schedule is Artemis from 2:30 PM to 5 PM and Star Trek from 5 PM until as long as unanimously decided.

So if you’ve got an itch that you just can’t scratch for both interactive and non-interactive Trek (sorta), then beam on down to Hive 76 this weekend.

Engage!

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Cellulose Some, and You Win Some

I have a new obsession — microbial cellulose.  I have been meaning to experiment with this stuff ever since I read Fermented Frocks, the New Couture.  Recently, my sister’s room-mate was discarding a kombucha culture, long past its prime, and I knew I had to have it — despite the fact that was about the closest thing to two gallons of pure biohazard that I have ever laid eyes on.  I peeled a few layers from the decrepit SCOBY that was floating in the middle of the rancid kombucha, and dried them into tough, leathery, translucent “paper” (see the photo with the “paper” covering a CD for perspective). After that, I was hooked — smell be damned — and after some research, I was really hooked.

Microbial "paper" formed by peeling a layer from a kombucha "pellicle" (a.k.a. SCOBY)
Microbial "paper" formed by peeling a layer from a kombucha "pellicle" (a.k.a. SCOBY)

Continue reading “Cellulose Some, and You Win Some”

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6/11/11 Open House Wrap-Up

First Officers Log, Stardate 64941.3…

Yesterday we ran a few games of Artemis Spaceship Bridge Simulator at our new Saturday Open House event, and we had a ton of fun. This time we decided to try out the “Into the Breach: Starfleet” mod by a team called NegativeZone. Basically, it’s a Starfleet mod for the game. It changes the main ship (the Artemis) into the USS Enterprise (NCC-1701), and also changes the enemies to the familiar: Romulan, Klingon, and Orion varieties. Personally, it was a great experience to be fighting Klingons and instead of the default game’s “Argonians” for a change. Since Artemis is not a Paramount/Universal intellectual property, this would not have been possible without a mod team like NegativeZone.

Of course we had the great Chris Thompson as our captain. We also had a few IRC regulars come in and play. Steve (aka Inspired Chaos) did a great job at helm, and Alex (aka Derpy) was awesome at his engineering duties. As fairly new players I have have to hand it to these guys, they’re quick learners and worked well under pressure. Lastly, I manned the science and communication stations simultaneously.

We played a few games at a very easy difficulty level to start off with.  We swiftly won those games. Then, we moved up to level 5. It was alot harder, with enemy ships capable of warp speed, as well as enemies with cloaking capabilities; but we ended up actually winning!

This game is really great fun all around, and everyone is invited to play our next game on Saturday, June 25th. Be sure to bring your laptop or netbook.

Live long and prosper!