DIY Gadgets

Developed by California architect Gregg Fleishman comes the DH1 Disaster House, a shed that can be put up in an afternoon. It’s a deceptively simple idea. Create a house that one doesn’t need a single nail to build. That’s because the home was designed with tabs that make it more a 3D puzzle to put together.

Initially designed to aid hurricane victims who have lost their homes, this alternative is designed to be a 14′ square shed built about 30″ off the ground. All one needs to do is unpack the stack of European birch plywood, put them together via the slots, and in about an hour, you have an instant place to hang your hat – porch included.

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Being eco friendly is the cool thing to do, so to show off your greenness why not build a wind turbine for your office, with the solar powered wind turbine kit.

As you don’t normally get much wind in an office (depending on who you’re sat next to), the turbines are powered by the power of the sun (or that florescent strip above), so it might not be saving any energy but at least it shows your good intentions.

The kit consists of 11 parts, is said to be “easy to assemble” and is available for ~£22.50 from Gadgets.dk.

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The sound of running water can be really relaxing, but the waterfall ornaments that you get at the local garden centre aren’t exactly gadgety or blessed with nerd appeal. So what we need is a DIY hydrodynamic building kit and look what we have here…

The hydrodynamic building set is like a 3D Scalectrix for water. Connect the tubes, girders, tanks, valves and pump to create your own futuristic water fountain. You can then either relax to the sound of running water or panic and reach for the nearest towel.

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When Dan Vance was making his 90 minute sci-fi feature “The Shivering Earth,” he couldn’t afford to use film or rent high def video cameras, he wasn’t satisfied with the quality of camcorders on the consumer market, and he couldn’t wait for the Red One to be made available for the masses.

So he did what any red blooded, enterprising film director would do … he designed and built his own video camera! Sure, it looks like a camera from the late 80s, but inside, it’s mechanics represent cutting edge video capture technology with tapeless recording via hard drive.

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Imagine it. Your baby daughter innocently breaks a piece off your son’s model airplane causing sibling rivalry to flare out of control. No problem, go online to the Revel website, pay .99 for the replacement, download the 3D file and hit print. In less time than it takes to drink a cup of java, you have a replacement part ready to reinstall, and his plane “flies” again.
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Sure, you want to make an affordable robotic/networked/embedded linux/mechatronix platform.

But, then you say to yourself,, “Self,, where would I find such a thing?”

Charmed Labs is where, and QWERK is what you’re looking for.

Their friends at the Carnegie-Mellon Robotics Institute have developed the TeRK Telepresence Robot Kit it uses theQwerk base units to operate.

They’ve got a great page that has robots you can make, tells you what tools and parts you need exactly, and even where to get them! It’s great!!

Finally people have a shot at making useful, powerful robotic applications at a small scale, and learning how to go about it for a “reasonable” price (let’s face it, sometimes 349.00$ is a tad harder to come by than we want to admit, especially for you brainiac younglings). Read the rest of this entry »

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Nick did a very cool post about where you could download free DIY paper plans for various Star Wars ships, I’ve just had an email from Robert of Smidigt to share with us that there are also plans for the various characters, they’ve got Stormtroopers, Boba Fett and of course Vadar himself. Read the rest of this entry »

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Pass me the sick bucket, this has got to be the soppiest DIY project yet, the everlasting kisses kit.

This craft kit lets you make fridge magnets that are an exact replica of your pouting lips, I suppose it does mean you can smother your beer fridge with the kisses it probably deserves.

You can get you own everlasting kisses kit from Boutique to You, sick bag not included.

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