Main Page - Fab @ Home

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Make your own rapid prototyping machine. Who wouldn't want to? Fantastic. This can be yours for about $2300, supposedly. Definitely want one.

Technical question: Can I use this to monitor domestic power consumption?

http://www.maplin.co.uk/Module.aspx?ModuleNo=46931&doy=5m3&ForceUpdate=Y


I want to monitor my domestic power consumption. Now there are any number of gadgets that will do this for a reasonable price - plug-in things that will tell you how much an individual appliance is using, or monitors that sit by your electricity meter. Being a cheapskate, though, can anyone tell me why I don't buy a cheap clamp meter from Maplin, which I can clamp round any wire in the place?

I suppose it will rely on certain assumptions, like fairly constant input voltage and fairly constant consumption from my bits and pieces, but as an energy saving measure, can anyone see any flaws in my plan? Do you think it will be sufficiently accurate?

'Tis the season for Christmas wish lists

http://www.core77.com/ultimategiftguide/
...and core77's combines the deeply weird and the deeply wonderful in about equal measure. Not sure how many of these I'd really want to own, but there are one or two things I can drool over in that list.

My personal favourite:

What is Art Clay Silver?

http://www.artclay.co.jp/htm/what.html


It's cool, is what it is!

Apologies to an arty crafty people who have seen this stuff before, but I am intrigued. Art Clay Silver is a malleable putty made up mostly of pure silver particles, with added water and 'organic binder' (which with a name like that could be anything - the mind boggles, recoils, and boggles again). According to the sales blurb, it can be worked like ordinary modelling clay, but when fired in a kiln the water and binder are burned off, leaving something which is 99.9% pure silver.

Although a kiln (which I don't own) is recommended, there is a method described for firing it on a gas hob (which I do own - yay!). Strangely, though, using a microwave isn't mentioned...

IWOOT: Joint-the-dots calendar

Christmas is coming - yeah, I know, I know, it's ages away really. In fact, it's maybe a little premature to be even talking about the beginning of December, but since that's the time of Advent calendars, this is maybe a timely product*: a join-the-dots calendar! Scribble little notes on it, and as the month goes on you can join the dots to create a little friend for the month! NB joining the dots in order is necessary - no creatives please.


* how about that for a link?! Yes, my career as a jurnalist is assured.

IWOOT (x): Street Art Shelving

Following on from Chris' post about graffiti-by-selective-cleaning, I just stumbled across these rather natty shelf units on Inhabitat. They're 'designed' by a guy called Ryan Frank, who takes plain boards down to Hackney and sticks them on walls in prominently graffiti'd areas. After a couple of weeks to 'mature', he takes them down again and makes furniture from them. It's another good example of 'less is more' in design terms - and I think it looks pretty cool.

Oh! Purdy! (vase)

Pretty vases! A little Dali-esque, if memory serves? From Little Wonder in Philadelphia, but distributed by a German company. So I don't know where they'll end up being sold. Nice, though. Thought some of you might like them.

And while I'm trawling the interweb, look at this! Holy crap! It's a sofa that turns into a set of bunk beds! Wow. I bet it's not very comfortable as a sofa, though.

Odd

Just plain silly.



Incidentally, why does Multiply's spell checker think I'm Spanish?

Woolly crash hat using supercustard stuff

This I found ages ago while trawling for stuff for skiing.  It's a hat! 

I love skiing, but I'm reluctant to wear a crash helmet despite hearing numerous horror stories (and knowing people who've been injured). The ribcap is kind of a halfway house - way cooler than a crash hat, it uses some weird stuff called d3o which takes the whole harden-on-impact thing to new levels. I want one, and it'd be brilliant for persuading kids who are too cool to wear something which might afford them some protection.

All the shops appear to be in Switzerland, which is a long way to go for a hat, but never mind that now.

IWOOT(x): Design without losing your soul

It's a book: 

I want one of these (5) - DIY radio

Less is more, right? Right? But... how little can you get away with? This design from wouter Geense design studio explores that territory - it's a radio which comes in a basically unfinished state, and you can use whatever you want as an aerial, buttons, etc. - even down to drilling your own arrangement of holes for the speaker (spell out your name? Why not?). I think it looks deliciously idiosyncratic, and cool, and I want one. But at a deeper level, it seems to me to pose an interesting question. When my Dad was a kid, his radio was a mass of wires on a bit of board, with a crystal and an earpiece. It was totally do-it-yourself. This one has taken that to a different level, but is it less designed than a 'proper' shop one?

Ach, who cares.

Picture card society

I must admit, I'm slightly obsessive when it comes to greetings cards. I always make my own Christmas cards, and I'm eternally on the lookout for something slightly different and memorable when it comes to sending people things. So when I came across this card society  on design*sponge, I immediately saw the appeal. Subscribe for a month, 3 months, 6 months, etc., and every month they send out unique (and very nice) cards which can't be found anywhere else. I love the clean designs, and I don't send that many cards so it'd be perfect. In fact, I'd subscribe now - if it wasn't so freakin' expensive.

I want one of these (4) - Zenkaya prefab

Somewhere between the so-called 'static caravan' and a fully-fledged house comes this beauty from Zenkaya, a South African firm. Not sure if it'd stand up to British weather (or even if they'll deliver that far), but really, wow.

I want one of these (3) - light switch surround

It's kind of premature, but I'm worrying that my new flat - which I'm basically furnishing from scratch - is going to end up a bit soulless and drop-in-bachelor-IKEA-ish (if that makes any sense).  This young lady has come up with just the sort of thing I'd never have thought of, but which I soooo want now I've seen it... How gorgeous is that?

 

via design*sponge - which also has something VERY exciting - Andy Lang, a guy I went to college with, has commercialised one of the designs he did as a student and took it to icff this year! Fantastic to see his grinning face, and the cycloc is a brilliant design - in fact, I was thinking just the other day I could do with one of these in my flat right now! He deserves all the success he can get, and it's good to see him out there.

 

I want one of these (2): Solar lamp

Gorgeous solar lamp with the solar panels incorporated into the design! That's something special.

I wasn't going to bother sharing this, but dammit, everyone needs a bit of extra elegance in their lives.

I want one of these (1): Lumen

Gorgeous, simple, clever. what's not to like?

The guy has several different designs - I particularly like the seagull one.