think|haus » Adina

Making Games at think|haus

Adina — Sun, 23 May 2010 15:06:05 +0000

The past few weeks have seen several members working on games at think|haus. Peter designed and made a lasercut chess set, I made some pieces for my travel Settlers of Catan, and JamesQ posted about his 3D chess idea below.

Peter took some really nice pictures of his chess set and posted them on the facebook. His pieces are really nice – very clean and sleek. Each piece is made out of two pieces of acrylic fitted together at 90°. I’ll add the thingiverse link when he’s put it up there.

A few years ago, I bought travel Settlers of Catan so that I could bring it with me on trips. Even the travel set is fairly big though, so I just used the cards and port pieces out of the box, and made my own tiles and cardboard pieces. The cardboard pieces are pretty awkward though, and I’ve never really been pleased with them. Today, I made up a little gcode file to cut out tiny roads, settlements, and cities.

If you want to build your own, check out the thingiverse project.

Filling laser etched acrylic: wax vs polymer clay

Adina — Sun, 16 May 2010 20:35:40 +0000

I made some business card holders for think|haus a few weeks ago. They turned out pretty well, but there was one problem: the etching isn’t really legible from any reasonable distance. I clearly needed to paint/fill the etching with something. I tried two different methods: wax crayon and polymer clay. Photos below the cut.

The polymer clay is on the left, and the crayon is on the right.

Here’s a cropped version of the last photo showing detail of the polymer clay. To apply it, I put a small amount of clay on my finger and rubbed it in. It fills really nicely and is easy to clean up. Not sure how well it will stay in though. If you can pull the clay out of the etch by pressing more clay on it.

Here’s the detail of the etch filled with crayon. It’s not terribly even, and is a bit harder to clean up afterwards. I tried using a room temperature crayon as well as a crayon I stuck into warm water. The warmth of the wax didn’t seem to make much difference, though I didn’t get the wax very hot. This method doesn’t really work for spots where the etching is wide.

Both methods make a huge difference in the legibility of the etching. It remains to be seen how durable they are. Other suggestions I’ve read include leaving the protective sheet on the acrylic while etching, painting, then removing the protective sheet. Unfortunately, this acrylic came with a paper protective sheet which bursts into flame if you try this. I’ll post updates on durability once they’ve been out in the field for a couple weeks.

Annual Meeting on June 15th

Adina — Tue, 11 May 2010 02:32:32 +0000

think|haus has been around for almost a whole year! That means that it’s time to have an AGM. It will be on June 15th, at 7PM. This breaks the not-having-business-meetings-at-open-haus rule, but it’s only once a year. Members can check out the agenda on the wiki page: http://wiki.thinkhaus.org/index.php?title=ThinkHausWiki:20100615AnnualMeeting

Peace,
Adina

Peter’s 3D printer on hackaday

Adina — Wed, 21 Apr 2010 00:19:23 +0000

Peter and his dad designed and built a 3D printer which is got posted to hackaday: http://hackaday.com/2010/04/19/makerbot-clone/. Cool beans.

A test post

Adina — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 00:50:26 +0000

Here’s a test post.

New Improved Lazzor – Now Cuts Circlez!

Adina — Wed, 13 Jan 2010 15:06:38 +0000

We have Trevyn, Jason, and Mike’s hard work to thank for the laser now being able to cut circles!

Upcoming Events

Adina — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 01:23:15 +0000

There are two events coming up this week:

Math Club: The different sizes of infinity – Thursday November 12th at 19:00

Infinity is a strange beast. You can add any number you care to think of to it, and it will stay the same size. So how can you have different sizes of infinity? Come to the talk, and find out.

Movie Night: ? – Friday November 13th at 19:00

Likely to be a double bill. Join the discussion on the forum about what movie we should watch.

Video of our laser

Adina — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 00:16:36 +0000

Much evil laughter and maniacal screaming of “Fiar tha laaaaazzzzzzzzooooooorrrrrr!” is going on down at the haus today. Also humming of this song.

Movie Night November 13th

Adina — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 00:43:09 +0000

Come one, come all, to the biweekly think|haus movie night. The next one will be on November 13th at 7:30. We’ll do a double bill again. Come early to argue about what we should watch, and complain about the crappy projector.

Talk times changed!

Adina — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 00:34:10 +0000

Since Jame’s Secure My Stuff talk was scheduled to conflict with the Hamilton LUG, it has been moved. It will now happen on the 3rd Wednesday of the month, starting next Wednesday Oct 21 at 19:00.

I, however, am even lazier, and have postponed Math Club to next month. Call it post miniSoOnCon burnout. Math club will begin on November 12th, at 7 PM and run subsequently on the 2nd Thursday of every month. The first talk will be about the different sizes of infinity:

Infinity is a weird concept. You can add one to it as many times as you like and it won’t get any bigger, so how can one infinity be larger than another? Come to the talk to find out. Don’t worry if you aren’t a math whiz: this talk should be understandable to pretty much anyone.