DIY Magazine

May 2013

DIY MAGAZINE IT’S TIME TO BE YOUR MAKER

3-D P R I N T I N G

anything PG 29

PG 34

Evan Voyles: Artisan Sign Maker

PG 16

Towers of Trash

PG 20

The Best Paper Plane

Photo by Zach Kosub

Photo by Allen Dehn

6 19 25 34

Capital Skatepark 3D Printing

Photo by Zillayali

The Junk King The Neon Jungle

Photo by Sam Lynaugh

WOODWORKING CRAFTS ELECTRONICS pg7 DIY WOODEN CUP - pg10 ALLEN DEHN

pg14 GLOW IN THE DARK EGGS - pg16 HE’S A JUNKIE - pg20 PAPER PLANE - pg22 CACTUS

pg24 LIGHTBULB - pg26 PENNY BATTERY - pg28 3D PRINTING

METALWORKING pg30 EONS OF NEON - pg33 TWO BRICK FORGE

Photo by Wonderlane

Photo by Mr T in DC

Photo by Evan Amos

Photo by the US Army

It’s Time to Meet Your Makers Photo By: Matthew Lynaugh

Sam “Mad Money” Lynaugh: Sam was born in Austin, Texas in 1998. He is a freshman at the Liberal Arts and Science Academy. He enjoys making basic electronics and metalworking projects. In his free time, Sam smelts metals, smells burning napkins, and shreds his credit cards. Currently he is a member of the robotics team. He aspires to become a surgeon and the world’s most renowned collector of burnt napkins.

Aaron Brodkin is a very punny guy who was born in the south side of Austin, Texas on April 26, 1998. In his freetime Aaron likes to skateboard, and is thus never board. Aaron enjoys making projects involving skateboarding. “The Brodster” currently is a Freshman at the Liberal Arts and Science Academy. He hopes to graduate before the age of 20, because he is a very school guy.

Photo By: Heather Lemon Brodkin

Aaron “The Brodster” Brodkin:

Photo By: Aaron Brodkin

Isaac “The Icy” Metcalf: Isaac is a freshman at the Liberal Arts and Science Academy and an avid DIYer. In his free time he researches photovoltaics, wind energy, nuclear fusion, and fuel cells. He enjoys bugging the guys in robotics, diagramming wind and wave generators he thought up on the bus, and trying to get the motor off of the broken washing machine in his garage.

Raina “The Rainmaker” Rahman: from time to time. She can knit and crochet. Currently she is a freshman at the Liberal Arts and Science Academy in Austin. She likes looking up simple and easy DIY crafts when she gets bored.

Photo By: Jaden Williams

Raina was born in 1998 in Austin, Texas. She enjoys making little DIY crafts

LETTER FROM THE

EDITORS

Dear Readers,

To begin, we are not responsible for any injuries you may sustain from trying to do any projects in this magazine.

Now, let’s continue. DIY is not a dying art. In fact, it’s everywhere nowadays.

It’s not uncommon to see a tutorial on how to make your very own alarm clock, or tips for handling huge projects. People are still realizing the benefits of making your own stuff. This magazine is dedicated to helping everyone see how easy it is to start DIY projects, and we hope you see one you like.

So go on, pick a project and get started.

The Team.

WOODWORK

do it yourself

Photo by Jaro Larnos

WOODEN CUP Story by Sam Lynaugh

1 2

Firstly, find yourself your tools and materials.

You’ll need a log the size of the cup you want (WARNING: do not use a poisonous wood), beeswax, a saucepan, a drill with large bits, a fire, sandpaper, a knife, and a spatula.

Photo by Sam Lynaugh

Get your fire going.

Once you’ve got plenty of embers and a strong fire, use your spatula to scoop up some embers, and pour them into your hole. Blow gently on the embers. Once the embers have gone out, empty out the cavity and repeat until the cavity of the cup is as large as you want.

Photo by Sam Lynaugh

3 4

Photo by Mori Claudia

Next, drill a large hole in the center of your piece of wood. Make sure the hole does not go through the bottom. Using your knife, widen the hole as much as possible.

Finish the cup. Sand the inside of the cavity until you cannot see any “burned” wood. To water proof the cup, melt beeswax in a saucepan.

Once it has reached a liquid consistency, use a stick to spread thin coat along the inside of the cup. Sit back and relax with a cold beverage!

Photo by Simon Eugster

7

YOU’RE HEADED TO THE

DANGER ZONE 25% off all of our most dangerous products

YOUR AD HERE! Call 1-800-YOURADHERE to advertise your business now!

Woo women with your six pack ads!

T

he inescapable clatter of skateboards radiates throughout a jungle of plywood and masonite. A mixed scent of sweat and plywood seems to follow you wherever you go, throughout a landscape of ramps and metal rails.

Throughout the day, you can find Allen Dehn shredding the ramps Capital Skatepark, his livelihood that he literally built from the ground up.

Allen Dehn is living the life, as the owner of a skate park and as a professional skater. He is part of the flow team for DC shoes, and has been in videos and commercials with professionals such as Paul Rodriguez, Theotis Beasley and Lil Wayne. “Dealing with the kids and being around skateboard stuff all day, its about the best job I can ask for.” says Allen. He even owns a brand of skateboards, as well as a pro shop inside of his park. To top it all off, he runs Capital Skatepark’s skate team.

To keep the money rolling in, Allen also does Summer Camps at his skate park, and teaches lessons at other skate parks, because he is currently in the process of moving his park 10: DIY: WOODWORKING

A bowl in the making at the new location of capital skatepark

BOARDOM AT ITS FINEST

A bowl in the making at the new location of capital skatepark

By Aaron Brodkin

from Round Rock Texas, to a central Austin location. Allen says the thing that separates Capital Skatepark from all of the other parks in Austin is him and his crew of “three other dudes.”

For those who aim to create their own skatepark, or just some ramps in their backyard, Allen has some words of wisdom. “Start with like ramps in your driveway and backyard and build up from there. Like if you want it to be this tall, make it that tall. Don’t start with like gnarly shit. If you want to make it small make it small and build your way up from there.” Take it from the pro, Allen has worked at Capital skatepark for 10 years, and has been building ramps since before he can remember. The basic materials required to make a quarterpipe include, plywood, masonite, screws, and 2 by 4s. The process with a small group of people will take about 2 to 3 hours depending on the size of the ramp being created, The ramps also have many other uses such as BMX biking, as well as skateboarding, and whatever else you want it to be.

The basic routine used to create a ramp consists of many steps. First,

To build one in a kid’s backyard for a birthday present and see him light up when he walks outside is such a heartwarming feeling. measure the radius. Depending on how drastic or mellow the radius is, determines the steepness of the ramp.

“After you cut your side pieces you cut the 2x4s for ribs 16 inch apart nail those to the 2 sides you cut. Put the plywood on the top 2 layers. Throw some coping in and a sheet of ply for the deck and Masonite it and golden.” Says Allen.

The sport of skateboarding was not popular at the time that Allen started skateboarding at the late age of 14, and the fact that he had nowhere to skate didn’t help. As a child Allen lived u in the panhandle of texas, and the only place he skated was on the small concrete slab at his house. Once he

It was Lil Wayne, Paul Rodriguez, Theotis Beasley, Boo Johnson, me, a couple of my roommates and all them.

A half pipe at the new Capita location in the maing

A half pipe at the new Capita location in the maing

got better, he was able to take up a few sponsors such as Cause skateboards and Globe shoes. At the young age of 17 Allen also had some injuries that set him back, such as when his hands slipped out from under him and he smashed out 6 of his bottom teeth. But he has since recovered.

Allen had to work extremely hard when he was a kid to get where he is now. He was saving up money for a car, but then by chance stumbled upon an offer for a skatepark. He saved up a little more money and bought the park and made it his own.

He had to work a lot of odd jobs as a kid, such as being the maintenance

A half pipe at the new Capita location in the maing

man at a hospital and washing dishes at a retirement home, but he says it all payed off in the long run.

Allen Dehn is quite the character, with hair like fire, he comes to work everyday dressed in the work uniform of a skater, a hoodie, shorts, and his skateboard. He has been through a lot to get to where he is

today and has achieved his goal in life.

If Allen could make it to where he is today, with a little hard work, and focus on his career, anyone can. He didn’t let the small problems in life get him down, instead he triumphed over them, anf didnt let them phase him.

He skated through life, and caught air with the big boys.

For more information about Allen and Capital Skatepark and pro shop, visit: www.capitalskateparkandproshop.com You can get everything from shoes to a skateboard, and have a skatepark right nearby.

11

NEW JERSEY STEEL BARON “quality steel for quality blades”

CRAFTS

cellent Proj ect

Here’s an

It will scramble your brains!

Story and Pictures By Raina Rahman

>

O

ut of ideas for fun stuff to do with friends? Have you found yourself sitting around doing nothing? Not anymore. Now you can have fun outside at night. With this how-to on glow-in-the-dark eggs, you and your friends can have a good old-fashioned egg hunt, but in the dark. Who says only kids go easter egg hunting? This way, anyone can enjoy playing around. These eggs are super fun and easy to make. Don’t sit around inside staring at the TV, go out into the dark and play! Also, fun variations of this tutorial can be found at Wikihow.com. Variations appear in this article for each step, just keep reading.

>

VARIATIONS ON THIS STEP INCLUDE:

1:

Gather a bunch of plastic easter eggs and glowsticks. Use as many as you want, just make sure the eggs open in half.

>

>

>

from Wikihow.com: paint your eggs with the mixture and wait for them to dry

VARIATIONS ON THIS STEP INCLUDE:

3:

You may want to tape the eggs shut, just in case the glowstick pops it open. Be sure from Wikihow.com: Pour 1 cup (8 oz) of water-based to use clear tape! acrylic varnish into a plastic cup and add 1/4 cup (2 oz) of glow in the dark powder and mix together.

VARIATIONS ON THIS STEP INCLUDE:

2:

Start breaking the glow sticks and tucking them inside from Wikihow.com: Use a very fine grit sandpaper the eggs. and lightly sand the outside of the plastic eggs

>

14: DIY: Craft

4:

ONCE IT GETS DARK, THROW THOSE EGGS INTO YOUR BACKYARD AND HAVE FUN!

VARIATIONS ON THIS STEP INCLUDE:

from Wikihow.com: Hide the eggs around the house instead, if going outside seems too dangerous.

The glowsticks usually last for about 6-8 hours, so plenty of time for tons of fun.

BUY THIS STUFF If you would like to use the Wikihow method, you can buy half a pint of water-based acrylic varnish for $9.99 at Amazon.com, what a steal!

For glow in the dark powder, Glow Inc. has a huge variety of colors for prices starting from $8.98. At http://glowinc.com

Even better, a pack of 100 8 inch glowsticks is only $8.99 at (once again,) Amazon.com. What a bright idea!

15

He’s A Junkie!

S

tanding in Vince Hannemann’s backyard makes his house seem like a tiny blue hut. The normal one story house sits in the middle of a normal street, but inside the fence lies a distinct sight. The Cathedral of Junk grows quietly in the backyard, seeming to rise overnight.

Currently the cathedral stands 30 ft tall, with three stories, staying true to its name by containing nothing but trash. Toilets lie in the walls, motorcycles stand in random places, people stick their cards in the spokes of bikes and just about anywhere a card can be stuck.

IDs, business cards, and student IDs cover each other up. Sharpie graffiti covers everything, dates of visits, quotes, names, and just about anything else one could write on the junk that makes up the Cathedral.

“There’s not enough art in this world,” creator of the Cathedral Vince Hannemann says.

Hannemann appears to lead a simple lifestyle, keeping nothing but the basics with him. He wears t-shirts and shorts, and clearly has a love of art. For Hannemann, art equals DIY. It is the product of his imagination, 100 percent of the time. It shows his own personality in it. He did it himself.

There’s not enough art in this world.

16: DIY: Craft

View of the Cathedral of Junk from the front.

The Cathedral is a piece of art, a life-sized diorama that you can walk into. Currently, the Cathedral of Junk holds the record for the largest building made of trash, not that an official record actually exists. But keeping that record is not a worry on Hannemann’s mind. “I would love to see more junk towers,” Hannemann says. He doesn’t care about staying on top, or owning the only trash tower. All he wants is to bring something special into the

world, and to be able to share it with other people. And he encourages other people to do the same. To create something beautiful to share.

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, as the saying goes. It certainly applies here. It was originally built as a sculpture, but it crossed the line into a building when it rose to three stories, complete with stairs and floors to walk on.

The inspiration for the Cathedral

By Raina Rahman Pictures by Zachary Kosub

A sign made of scrap metal placed against the fence.

didn’t just pop into Hannemann’s head overnight. He started with his first trash sculpture in 1979, at age 16 in Los Alamos, New Mexico.

Since then, Hanneman created junk sculptures wherever he went. The Cathedral itself started in 1989, once he moved to Austin. Hannemann started with lining hubcaps along the fence. “I called it Yardspace 11, because it was the 11th sculpture I had made,” Hannemann said, “But my mom, she was like, ‘No, this is a cathedral. It’s basically a cathedral of junk,’ and so I guess the name kinda stuck.” As Hannemann explained the stages of his creation, he pointed to the pictures on a timeline he created for this exact purpose, to give a more detailed history.

The timeline is located in a tiny shack to the right side of the entrance. It includes the timeline on the right side wall, with pictures to go with every event, along an amazing map of Africa made with trash on the left wall. Next to the shack, Hannemann placed a stand with a mini donation trash can.

People don’t have to donate, but the sheer magnificence of the Cathedral usually convinces them to anyways.

Glass bottles hanging from the ceiling on the third floor.

The making of the cathedral wasn’t all smooth sailing. Hannemann was met with plenty of opposition as he kept building. Not only that, but his personal life became complicated. “After my second wife left me, I decided I was done with this stupid project,” Hannemann said. “I threw out probably around 40 tons of junk. I became kind of

I threw out probably around 40 tons of junk. depressed, and so I kept trying to take it down,” but by then it was too late. The Cathedral grew too big to take down so quickly.

By 2008, Hannemann got ready to build again. He quit his daytime job as a healthcare worker and switched to building the Cathedral for a living. He ended up using the 40 tons of junk he took out to build a new section of the Cathedral.

In 2010, the city fought against Hannemann and tried to get him to tear it down. In the end Hannemann decided he would listen to the city and tear it down. Instead he got inspired again. He added another 20 tons to the Cathedral, but the city made him get a building permit. They put their foot down on that rule. Even after he got a permit, the city had three lawyers, two engineers, and one architect check out the Cathedral. No matter what they checked, they couldn’t find a weakness in the building. So Hannemann got back to business.

Most people love the Cathedral of Junk. There is rarely a bad review of it. Spy Kids the movie used it as a background, and Bank of America shot a commercial there. “Yeah, I actually have this zombie thing being shot here at the end of the month,” Hannemann says, “This place actually gets really creepy at night. You don’t know, because you’re just seeing the happy face of me. But I’m really worried about a zombie apocalypse. This place gets so dark, and it’s like looming.

Once the shoot is over, I won’t have a problem seeing the zombies

17

come out.” Maybe being around the cathedral by himself all day long is having a certain affect? “Now it’s basically growing on its own. It’s like a Stephen King novel, [The Cathedral] is my master,” he said.

Put all that aside, and the cathedral is an innovative place to go and see.

Whether you find it beautiful or repulsive is an opinion that needs to be formed in front of the Cathedral itself. How else can one truly grasp the view of the Cathedral? “I’m not finished with it yet, not really. I plan on finishing up in two years, complete the 3rd floor , maybe with stairs, and add some lights, then I’ll be done with it,” Hannemann says.

So the world can look forward to a few more additions to this already original piece of art.

“Welcome to Fabulous Trash Texas” sign at entrance of Cathedral.

Hannmenan’s House is located at 4422 Lareina Dr Austin, TX 78798, so feel free to stop by, just give a call or ring the gong at the gate to let Hannemann know you’re there.

Hanneman’s house from the street.

18: DIY: Craft

An extended diving board on the third floor, it is ok to walk on it.

HOBBY LOBBY

In order to DIY, there is some stuff you need to buy.

Come FLY With Me!

Photos and story by Aaron Brodkin

R

eady to create a totally fly paper Airplane in just 7 easy steps? I thought so! the materials that you will need in order to create this masterpiece are just your hands and one sheet of notebook or printer paper. (printer paper is always best). So what are we waiting for? Lets go! But remember do do your stretches or you’ll be soar in the morning!

Materials

The only materials that you need to create this plane is some printer paper and your hands! That being said , there are many brands of paper in this world to choose from. Luckily I have some reccommendations to make sure that you make the right decision.

Any type of paper works, but I strongly reccomend “Hammersmith” for their cheap and quality paper.

1

First fold the peice of paper in half long ways.

2

Next fold the upper right and left hand corners in so that they form a right angle against the center crease.

20: DIY: Craft

3

Now fold the two right angle corners in so that they form one large triangle.

4

Then fold the right and left hand corners in again, but this time they should be pinting towards the center crease, leaving a little bit of room for one small triangle.

5

Now fold the small triangle up so that it is covering the two corners.

6 Now flip the plane over so that the small triangle is holding the two cornerrs together and the plane is in half.

7

Fly The plane and have fun!

Flight 101

In order to correctly fly this plane, you must hold the plane by the “lock”, and toss the plane. Experiment with how hard you throw the plane because the plane will perform different stunts based on how it is thrown. If you want the plane to do a loop, then add the fins mentioned in the paragraph “tips and adjustments” and throw the plane very hard. If u want the plane to turn in a different direction then tweak the rudder based on the direction you want it to turn.

Photo courtesy of Geoffrey Tian

You can also use your plane as a self-defense weapon.

Tips and Adjustments

When creating this pane for the first time there will probably be some adjustments that you will need to make.

If your plane nosedives from the start, simply pinch the back part of the wings upwards. This will create lift and will probably fix your problem.

If your plane stalls (flys straight up, then plummets to the ground), then add a weight to the nose, such as a stapler or paperclip, or add fins to the plane.

These fins should be approximately 1-2 centimeters in lengths and should be at the ends of the wings. If your plane flys too far to the lefot or the right, simply tweak the rudder of the plane in the direction that it turns. For example if the plane turns to the left, tweak the rudder to the left. This should make your plane fly straight. If none of these adjustments work, then the plane could be misfolded. Don’t let this get you down though! Practice makes perfect!

For more great paper airplanes check out the “Klutz Book of Paper Airplanes!

21

CACTUS Materials

- One well rooted cilindrical cactus, possibly harrisia or hylocerius - A colorful cactus closely related to the first one, from a nursery or a clipping

Story by Isaac Metcalf

CONGLOMERATE W hen

people think of DIY, they think sewing, tea cozies, maybe a plywood birdhouse or coffee table in the garage. When they think of schulptures, marble busts and modern metal statues may come to mind. But here’s a project to make beautiful, living works of art out of cacti found at your local nursery. The end product is dazzling and mysterious, but all it takes is a little DIY enthusiasm and some help by mother nature.

- Two or three rubber bands

Photo by Wikicommons.com

Pictures by Isaac Metcalf

Using gloves and a sharp knife, cut the top cleanly off of the rooted cactus parallel to the base. Take the second cactus, and cut two or three inches below the top, also parallel.

Although you don’t need them, keep the top of the first cactus and the bottom of the second, so you can use them later.

Take the top of cactus two, and place it on the stump at the top of cactus one. Make sure the exposed material on the two cacti are touching as much as possible.

The top cactus will grow into the bottom cactus, using its root system to get nutrients. Without a good connection, the two cacti will never Take the rubber bands and fasten the two cacti together securely. make sure the cacti won’t slip. If slipping occurs, the cacti will not be able to join.

After a few weeks the cacti will join together and you can take the rubber bands off. The top cactus will continue growing on the base, creating a crazy living sculpture.

22: DIY: Craft

ELECTRONICS

T

he light bulb, originally invented by Joseph Swan and then remade by Thomas Edison, holds a position of high esteem in the world of DIY. Thomas Edison took 3000 attempts before finally getting it right- but now DIY Magezine will give it to you in one try. So here it is:

THE

{DO-IT-YOURSELF

{

lightbulb Story and illustrations by Isaac Metcalf

MATERIALS

One jar with a metal or cork lid Three feet copper wire One large battery (6 volts) Thin iron wire (picture hanging wire)

1)Punch two holes in the lid of the

jar with a nail. Cut the copper wire in half, strip the ends, and put one wire in each hole, about two inches deep.

2)Make a hook at the end of each

copper strand. Then take a few individual strands of iron wire, and wind them from one copper wire to another.

3)Put the completed cork-wire as-

sembly back in place on the top of the jar, and attach the other ends of the two wires to the terminals of the battery.

4)Bask in the glorious home made

incadescent glow! Then, experiment. See what happens when use use more or less iron wire. (Carefully) experiment with more or less power.

Project from Smithsonian.org

24: DIY: Electronics

Est. 1915

Central Texas Metal Recycling

Project Too Much For You?

Don’t Worry. We’ll Take It.

S

hocking!

A USE FOR THE PENNY

by Sam Lynaugh

What’s

a penny battery, you ask? A penny battery is exactly what it sounds like; a battery, made of pennies, vinegar and cardboard, that’s perfectly capable of powering electronics.

Most of the time, when your electronics die, you just walk to the corner store and buy some double A’s. However, the penny battery has its uses. Crash land on an island with only a bunch of gameboys?

Penny battery. Calculator dies in the Outback?

Penny battery. Need to charge your phone while being chased by the Yakuza? Penny battery.

When two metals connect using an electrolyte (in our case, vinegar), a chemical reaction occurs on each metal surface. When conductive surfaces connect these two metals, it creates an electric current. Accoriding to Julie Yu, Alessandro Volta, an Italian physicist discovered this concept when, in the late 1800s he created the first battery, using copper, zinc and sulfuric acid. He called this battery a voltaic pile.

26: DIY: Electronics

Photo by Popular Science

How it Works

Photo by Daniel Schwen

Materials • • • • • • • •

Alessandro Volta

• • • •

six pennies one cup of vinegar cardboard wire electrical tape salt water sandpaper (or a dremel, belt sander, or hand sander) knife spoon wire strippers LED or other electronic

1

Collect your materials! You’ll need six or more pennies, some vinegar, salt, water and some small pieces of cardboard for the first part of this project. Put them all in your workspace, close to you for easy access.

2

To create the water vinegar mixture, mix to tablespoons of water with one cup of vinegar. Then, add a pinch of salt, and stir the mixture until all of the salt dissolves.

Add another pinch of salt, and stir until it dissolves once more.

Continue stirring and adding salt until the salt no longer dissolves.

3

Photo by Sam Lynaugh

On your piece of cardboard, trace out five circles around the size of your pennies. Cut them out with your knife, and place them inside the vinegar solution. Allow them to sit for at least five minutes, so that the vinegar soaks through them.

Use It!

Wire this bad boy to almost anything: Most people use an LED, but a calculator, a gameboy, or even a AA charger would all work. All that you need to do is attach the negative wire (the one on the bottom) to the negative prong on your electronic, and the positive wire (the one on top) to the positive prong. According to Rhett Allain of Wired Magazine, each cell should yield around 1.39 Joules.

5

When the pieces of cardboard are done soaking, remove them from the mixture. Blot off any excesss liquid, because if the cardboard drips on the completed product, it can short circuit the battery.

6

It is now time to assemble your battery! Stack the pennies, with the sanded side facing upwards, and the soaked cardboard. It should be stacked like this: penny, cardboard, penny, cardboard, penny, cardboard, and so on. When you run out of pennies and cardboard, place the last intact (unsanded) penny on top of the final piece of cardboard.

7

Now, take your wire. Using your knife, cut it into two pieces, and then strip both ends of each piece.

Then, take one of those pieces, and place it on the top penny, and tape it there. Take the other piece of wire, place it on the bottom penny, and tape it there as well. At this point you may now wrap the entire battery with electrical tape to increase its longevity and mobility.

Electronic of choice

4 1

Unsanded penny

2

If done correctly, you will see the silver of zinc.

3

Positive wire

6

Illustration by Sam Lynaugh

Take five of your pennies. Make sure the pennies originate from after 1982, as pennies made prior to 1982 contain very little zinc, according to the U.S. Mint.

Using your sandpaper, sand down one side of the penny until you can see only zinc (the silver metal underneath the copper). A dremel, belt sander, or hand sander will make this step go significantly faster.

4

Soaked cardboard

Sanded penny

5 Negative wire

27

By Is

aac Me tca lf

The

A

G N I H T Y N

POWER of 3D Printing H alf a Billion dollars.

That’s the amount of money Singapore plans to invest in 3D printing over the next 5 years. The small island nation has become another of the many countries investing heavily in the additive manufacturing industry.

3D printing has gained support on a national level around the world as its advantages reveal themselves, namely: to make anything, anywhere, for a fraction of the cost of normal manufacturing.

The U.S. has also invested heavily in 3D printing. In 2012, five separate federal agencies put a total of 30 million dollars towards a new Additive Manufacturing Innovation Institute, located in Youngstown, Ohio.

“3D printing may have applications 28: DIY: Electronics

within a wide range of industries including defense, aerospace, automotive, and metals manufacturing,” writes Joe McKendrick, contributing editor for smartplanet.com. According to McKendrick, all four industries will benefit from an additive manufacturing center.

much smaller scale. Around the country new 3D printing companies have begun popping up on street corners and in office buildings. The companies usually market themselves as prototypers, meaning larger companies will hire them to make accurate models of new devices not yet on the market.

“The Department of Defense envisions customizing parts on site for operational systems that would otherwise be expensive to make or ship ... The Department of Energy anticipates that additive processes would be able to save more than 50% energy use compared to today’s ‘subtractive’ manufacturing processes,” McKendrick writes.

One such company, Solid Prototype, makes its home in North Austin. From outside, the small office building is indistinguishable from the pediatric dentistry office next door. Inside, however, the office becomes cluttered with multi-colored plastic models. A miniature house, a realistic human spinal column to scale, and a strange child’s toy comprised of a ball within a ball within a ball all rest on a large wooden table that takes up most of the space in the small room.

The U.S. market has also been taken with 3D printing, although on a

Charles Barton Bollfrass, CEO of Solid Prototype, seems more fit for a job as an indie musician than a 3D printing entrepreneur. Tall, bald, and with an orange goatee, he used to hold a position as a naval diver. He talks like he’s meeting an old friend, and leans back in his chair nonchalantly.

Manufacturing 101 Subtractive manufacturing, the most commonly used process, breaks a large amount of starting material into a smaller end product.

would tell you that that’s impossible.

Because you can only make this in a 3D printer.” Barton says.

3D printers, or at least the good ones, have a fascinating method for making objects like this. They build the first ball, fill in the space around it with water soluble plastic, then build the second ball Solid Prototype around that, and so uses only one Additive manufacturing takes the on. That leaves the opposite approach: it builds the printer: an Objet printer with a solid brand Connex 3D end product up from spools of lump of plastic, starting plastic, minimizing waste. printer, possibly which then goes to Photos by Wikicommons.com the best on the a bath of water (or market, with a value of 250,000 weak acid). All of the soluble plastic dollars. The printer paid for itself in dissolves, leaving three unattached eight months. balls rolling within each other.

It’s easy to see why companies would flock to Solid Prototype so eagerly. “Everything we do is one day turnaround. We’re the fastest company on the planet,” Barton says.

Prototypes printed in Barton’s Objet Connex take less time and money to manufacture than prototypes made using subtractive manufacturing.

“Subtractive manufacturing is a lot more expensive. [And] Additive is significantly faster,” Barton explains.

That ability, unique to 3D printers, cannot transfer over to large scale manufacturing. The vast majority of all manufacturing industries use subtractive, not additive, manufacturing processes. The ball won’t show up in stores until industries embrace 3D printing.

According

to

Barton,

additive

Printing objects within objects: First, the multiple objects are built inside soluble support material.

Then, the extraneous material is dissolved, leaving the objects seperate within each other.

manufacturing has major implications for the industrialized world and holds the potential to revolutionize global manufacturing.

But 3D printing started as and remains predominantly a medium for DIYers. Merek Travnikar, robotics team member and 3D printer owner, uses his printer to make parts for his robotics class.He holds up a bright orange plastic wheel hub, a circular plate three inches across with holes to attach it to a motor. He made it with his PrintrBot, a strange looking device that more closely resembles a 3D jigsaw puzzle than a 3D printer.

“Yes, I built it,” Travnikar says. “The basic kit cost 800 dollars.”

If Solid Prototype’s printer does have any limitations, they arise from the fact that their Connex has too many capabilities. As an example, Barton holds up the strange ball within a ball within a ball.

“If you came to me with a design for a toy like this, and you wanted to sell it at every Toy Joy in the world and they would make a million of them a year, I

A few 3D printed toys, pictured here next to a home- use 3D printer. Picture by Daniel Teal.

29

Travnikar, one of many DIYers in the US who have opted out of simply buying a printer and have instead built it from a kit and some online videos, has nothing negative to say about his printer. He gestures at the complex machine.

“This one is designed to be built by people who don’t have to be super mechanically savvy. There are some printers which are extremely complex ... [T]he printer we finished recently, its a 125 page instruction manual to put it together, and it took us about a week of solid effort.” Travnikar Recalls.

Travnikar uses his printer to make things he otherwise would have to manufacture in his high school metalshop. Usually, the shop is more than capable of handling Travnikar’s projects. But for very specific pieces like his wheel hub, with strange extrusions that serve specific purposes, the time commitment would become too massive without a printer.

According to Travnikar, 3D printers use three separate programs.

“You have your CAD program, which is Solidworks, or there’s also Openscad. There’s many CAD programs out there ... Then, you need to take your 3D file and you need to slice it, which means you slice it up into a bunch of layers that 3D print because it prints one layer at a time. I use a program called slicer, but there’s a few others like Skienforge. What it does is it slices the object and turns it into the G code,” Travnikar says.

“G code is what the 3D printer actually runs on. It tells it to go to this point and then this point and this point, and extrude and go along this arc and everything.” Travnikar draws an imaginary arc in the air.

30: DIY: Electronics

Travnikar’s 3D printer, shown building a wheel hub. Picture by Isaac Metcalf.

“And lastly, you take that G code and you pop it into a control software. It will actually take the G code, and it will interpret it and send it out to the printer, telling it at certain times where to go. And then lastly, the printer will interpret where it needs to go, and then adapt that to the number of steps- each step a motor needs to tick in one direction to move that far.”

As he talks, Travnikar’s printer whirrs away behind him. The pen attachment flies from one spot to another, trailing melted plastic. It switches between shaky movements and long smooth arcs, mapping out what will soon become a new Raspberry Pi case. It builds it up layer by layer, drawing with near-perfect accuracy.

Travnikar admits that his printer doesn’t have a 100 percent success rate. But he doesn’t see that as a serious inhibition.

“You make [the printer], and then you can build [a part], and if its wrong, you can build another one, and if its wrong, you can build another one.

And soon you’ll be able to recycle these, and grind them up and make new ones,” Travnikar says.

The speed at which 3D printing improves impresses Travnikar just as much as the actual technology.

“It’s practically improving by the day,” Travnikar says. “It started with just a couple. This was actually one of the first, printrBot right here, started in a kickstarter. And then, it’s just exploded. There’s so many 3D printers out there, and so many people just developing, and innovating, and trying to make the better printer.”

According to Barton, as printing technology improves and prices drop more and more people will buy into the industry. Unfortunately, that puts his job in jeopardy.

“Butchers used to be used to cut meat, but now nobody goes to them.

There’s only a small window before everybody has one of these in their homes,” Barton says.

Both Travnikar and Barton agree that it won’t take long for the 3D printing industry to gain public support. Today though, the technology remains in the hands of DIYers like Travnikar, and entrepreneurs like Barton. 3D printing may appear foreign to the average person now, but so did computers 40 years ago. The now isolated niche will soon begin to grow, from DIYers, to backyard tinkerers, to hobbyists and finally the general public. Just like their parts, 3D printers will start to build up, layer by layer.

METALWORK

1202 South Congress, Austin TX

EONS OF NEON

A

small, white, stone building stands in south Austin. Inside, past the dusty mannequins and cloth cluttering the front room, things ranging from scrap steel to live ammunition litter the floor of a large workshop. Stock metal covers the floor, and a large table takes up the center of the room. Standing at the table, Evan Voyles fits the front of an aluminum sign onto its steel skeleton.

“I’m placing words on the page that is the street,” Voyles says. “Each facade is a page in a book, and I’m trying to do a series of them.” From the rabbitriding cowboy of Uncommon Objects to the life-like coiled rattlesnake of Ranch 616, Evan’s company, the Neon Jungle, has created over 500 vintagestyle signs. They bring the excitement and thrill he found in the streets of his childhood to Austinites today.

1512 South Congress, Austin TX

1508 South Congress, Austin TX

32 DIY Metalwork

Voyles distinctly remembers one sign from his childhood, the Terminix Bug. “It turned! And it was huge!

And it was lit up, and its eyes lit up, and its tentacles lit up, and it, it looked like a wild creature from a bad Japanese movie,” Voyles says enthusiastically. He remembers

Story and Art by Sam Lynaugh

opening the sunroof of his father’s car to look up at the spinning neon sign, and making his father drive around the block just to look at it again.

“Much of my early experience of the street figured around that bug,” Voyles says. “I also had my first car wreck, right across the street from that bug. And I blamed the bug for it.” He recollects his father leaving him in the car to pick up pizza from across the street.

“As soon as he went in I started [messing around],” Evan says. “The next thing you know, I had it in gear, and you know I backed out into Lamar Boulevard; and hit a car load full of Mexicans! And they were astonished to see a three year old at the wheel. My dad hears the wreck, comes running out of the pizza place, with the pizza, the bug is going ‘naaahhhhhhh!’ and my dad is going ‘aaaaah!’ Pretty wild scene.” Evan laughs. “If you’d told me then that someday [I’d] be making that kind of thing, I probably would have laughed, but I woulda said ‘great,’ of course then, you know, my career and education took all kinds of twists and turns before I found my way back to that.”

1204 South Congress, Austin TX

Evan describes the process of acquiring a sign. “People used to say, ‘what do you pay for old signs?’ and I’d say, ‘you’ve always got to pay something. Even when they’re free, they always cost something,’” he says. “This motel, in the middle of nowhere... near Abilene, was changing hands.” Voyles stopped by on his way home to Austin, and asked them for their sign. They told him to come back and take whatever he wanted. “I was driving a Peugeot 504, in those days... a sexy little french roadster. It is not meant for hauling back signs.” To bring the 600 pound sign back to Austin, Voyles rigged what he called a “Rube Goldberg idea” to the back of his car. He had a pickup bed on hitched to the back of the roadster, with a roof rack on top. Knowing he wouldn’t be able to lift the sign himself, he decided to “drop” the sign onto the car. It flattened the little car. Determined to bring the sign back, he decided to try and drive the roadster, even in its flattened condition. “The car looked like an airplane,” Voyles says.

Every time a truck drove by, the little roadster would get a few inches of air.

1415 South Congress, Austin TX

Evan graduated cum laude from Yale with a degree in intensive English.

Instead of becoming a professor, as he says they trained him to, Voyles hit the back roads and headed out west.

“You could argue that I am pursuing a career in intensive english. There’s nothing more intensive than trying to say something to someone going 55 miles an hour, who’s only got 2 seconds to give you attention. I’m writing very short haikus.” He wanted

to write, but he said he hadn’t lived yet. Voyles drove through the roads of the west, collecting Americana and inspiration as he went. “That’s where I got interested in signs. That’s when I started collecting them. I became an antique dealer when I was out on the road,” Voyles says.

“When I say out on the road, I wasn’t a touring musician. I literally lived in a Toyota land cruiser for two years. And did whatever I wanted.”

Somehow, he made it to his shop with the sign intact, although it almost cost him his life. However, he now had to get it off the pickup bed. He realized he could just split it in half, and decrease the weight enough for him to lift it. “Like splitting a sandwich. I take the top, you take the bottom, and we both have the illusion of a whole sandwich.” In the process of taking the sign apart, Voyles learned how to put one together.

Voyles attributes his start in signmaking to a specific sign: a coffee cup, owned by a museum in Abilene.

“It was purely out of frustration,” he says. Voyles remembers being told he couldn’t buy the sign, and decided to build his own. “I said, ‘I’ve seen how this is done. I can 33

do it myself.’” Through luck and some skill, Evan built a copy and sold it to a local coffee shop. “I was self-taught,” he says. “It didn’t seem hard because I didn’t know better.”

Evan found success early in his career.

“I quickly got business, and that was just lucky... It wasn’t that I went out looking for business, I did one sign, and somebody saw it, and found me, asked me to do one for them, and other people saw that, and one thing just lead to another. I never advertised. I never solicited work... it just came to me.” Evan pauses. “I just did what I wanted to do, and was lucky to find people that wanted to pay me to do it... So, my marketing is [DIY], and my methods are [DIY], since I taught myself how to do it.”

Voyles says that he took his name out of the phonebook a few years ago, to “[eliminate] the people who are just dialing everybody.” He says, “I’m not trying to hide, I just really want to be found by the people who make the effort to find me.” He wanted to limit his work to the type

1200 Soutch Congress, Austin TX

34 DIY Metalwork

of sign he wanted to make, the type that interests him and that he finds exciting; vintage signs. “If I’m not interested, why am I doing this?”

When offered a job he finds

I’m not trying to hide, I just really want to be found by the people who want to find me. interesting, Evan first looks at the building. “I need to see how the approaches are, how the traffic is going to view it, because that’s how most people are going to see it; from a car. How fast that traffic is going, where the sun falls on the building, how the building is constructed, how I could place the sign without compromising the building, and how it fits in with the other buildings around it,” Voyles says. “I’m trying to make sure everybody plays nice

together instead of putting something that looks like it was taken off of some strip mall somewhere.” Once settled on a final design, Evan blows it up on a projector, and traces onto aluminum.

He cuts it out with a jig saw, bends aluminum for the sides, and makes the steel skeleton. Then he pop rivets it all together, and sends out to get the neon tubes bent. With all the parts assembled, he rolls it out of his shop, and attaches it to the building.

Voyles describes what he calls the three key components to a successful career. “Passion, skill, and luck,” he says. “Be ruthless with yourself. You’re the only one who’s going to. At the end of the day, it’s just you,” he says. “Don’t assume it’s for the rest of your life.”

Evan tells me there are other things besides sign-making he wants to do.

“I do wanna write a book. Or five, before I die. So I gotta keep living.”

He emphasizes that money isn’t everything. “Happy. Happy is kind of everything.”

do it yourself

TWO BRICK FORGE Story and art by Sam Lynaugh

Firstly, find yourself your tools and materials. You’ll need two soft insulatory firebricks (you can find these at most pottery stores), a knife or chisel, and a blow torch.

1 2

Next, draw your pattern onto one of your firebricks. It should a large opening on one side, which continues to one inch from the other side, where the channel shrinks to the size of the head of your blowtorch.

Chisel out the pattern. It should be approximately a fourth of an inch deep.

Dump the dust into a trashcan.

3 4

Place the second brick on top of the first. To use the forge, place your steel in the large compartment, and insert your blowtorch through the small hole on the other side.

35