Firelabs:

Continued from Page 8 hearts. He plans to put them in bundles to sell to friends and family.

Falan and his family are from Michigan, but they come down for the winter. He either throws pottery or comes to Roswell Firelabs to work on wood projects. He said nobody has access to the number of tools Roswell Firelabs has.

“You can come over here and pick your project, and you’ve got something to work with,” Falan said.

Strika personally likes to operate the high-tech stuff, like CNC, or computer numerical controlled, router.

In a demonstration, Strika walked to a nearby computer that has cloud-based software, used to carve designs on a number of different materials.

Roswell Firelabs also has 3D-printing. Strika said his number one functional 3D-prints are vacuum adapters for different size hoses.

“I’ve 3D-printed more things than I can count,” Strika said. “How do I adapt a 5-inch pipe down to a 2 ½-inch part? It doesn’t exist … That’s a custom-made part that someone needs to make.”

Strika said many members use Roswell Firelabs as a launching point with prototyping. Some use the shop to sell products on Etsy for a living, he said.

Roswell Firelabs has proven functional outside of personal items. Members have built parade floats for the city’s Youth Day Parade, winning first place in the Civic Club Division in 2018 and 2019.

The first year, they built a replica of a 3D-printer that had a gantry, allowing the replica to move. The second year, they built a float that resembled NASA Mission Control. Strika said kids were sitting at desks, pretending to be scientists.

Strika hopes to collaborate more with the city, like making public art installations.

“Since we’ve actually kind of grown into our own space, we can start focusing outward instead of inward,” Strika said.

Early on, Strika said the board for Roswell Firelabs had to ask questions about how to get enough members to keep the place going.

“And now it’s like, how can we help the community more than just what’s inside our walls?” Strika said.