Yesterday saw a great turnout at the FabTable (held every 6 weeks). Our hosts were Thuur, Bart and Peter at the brand new FabLab Groningen.

They opened their doors March 1st (official opening on the 31st). With delegations from The Hague, Utrecht, Amsterdam, Enschede, Leuven (Belgium) and even Iceland, it was a great afternoon that stretched well into the evening over dinner in the ‘Het Paleis’ venue where the FabLab is located as well.

FabLab Groningen, Smari McArthy and Thuur Caris in conversation

The beautifully renovated 19th century former chemistry lab of the local University is a fitting environment for the newest FabLab in the Netherlands. The building is populated with lots of different companies and artists, making it into a major hub for the creative industry in the north of the Netherlands. A theater and conference venue, hotel accommodation, rooftop apartments as well as a restaurant make it a great spot in a quickly redeveloping area just a few minutes walk north of Groningen’s city center.

FabLab Groningen has a Trotec 60W laser cutter, a Zcorp 3D powder printer and a 3D full color scanner to go with it, a Modela CNC router, a vinyl cutter, as well as a home built vacuum-form (at 50 Euro!), a t-shirt press, and a rotary engraver. Of course they are also connected to the Polycom video-conferencing system (using a software based solution, not the expensive Polycom hardware). The big screen providing a window on the other labs is mounted on a wall that is painted with a world map showing the various locations of FabLabs from around the world.

Conversations, and Polycom screen and cam mounted on wall with FabLab world map

Discussions during the FabTable ranged from business models to our shared efforts around the different websites we run, legal aspects and creative commons for product development, and organizing the Fab6 conference in August. Elmine did a whole range of video interviews for both the FabLab documentary she is making, as well as the FabLab video channel the good people of 23Video provided us with. Over dinner we swapped more stories, enjoying the beer, food and hospitality of the restaurant two doors down from the FabLab in the inner court yard of this amazing facility ‘Het Paleis’.

More pictures in this photoset, and FabLab Groningen’s own photo stream.

• USB- (Universal Serial Bus) it works with 5 volts
• USB- provides power, sends and receives data
• Capacitor-stores electrical charge. Absorbs electrons and it releases it very quickly
• Electrolyte Capacitor- is polarion which means it has two saids which are positive and negative. There’s only one way to plug it. Some Examples would be a magnet, battery and LED light
• Ceramic Capacitor is non polarion which means that it doesn’t matter how it should be plugged in
• 5 Volts Regulator(7805) has 3 legs which are supply voltage(absorbs the energy), ground and the other end which releases 5 volts.
• Multimeter-a device which measures the amount of energy the subject is giving off or has

Visited a pharmacy near the presidential palace. It is supposed to be the best pharmacy of the ones still standing. There were better pharmacies, we’re told, but they were destroyed. The lady at the counter told us that not too many people come for things. In particular, I asked about insulin – they have none. But apparently one a small handful of people have come asking for insulin, anyway.

• Today at green i used google sketch up and learned how to rotate an object
• Anything plastic higher then 1 or 2 is not recyclable.
• Papers are recyclabler except when they are not clean.
• we researched signs for recycling because we are going do a project and we need a recycle sign for the garbage container.
• We took all stuff from the garbage of our class and put them in the right container.
• I learned how to make a roof shape on the google sketch up.
• I learned how to take an object and fit it on anyother object on google sketch up.

Listen up geeks: you do not want to miss what's goin' down in the labs this Spring. We have new classes and old classics seeking open minds and able hands to help us hack and hot wire our way out of winter. Behold-It's Springtime in the FabLab!

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MARCH
13: Intro to the Laser Cutter 10am-1pm $65
18&25: Electronics for Artists 7-10pm $100(includes parts)
20&27: Lasercut a Pinhole Camera 1-4pm $55

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APRIL
3: Intro to the Laser Cutter 10am-1pm $65
22: Programming Workshop 7-10pm FREE

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MAY
1: Intro to the Laser Cutter 10am-1pm $65
5,9&12: Laser Cut Japanese Woodblock Printing $125
6,13,20&27: Introductory Arduino 7-9pm $200 (includes parts)

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Sounds like fun, don't it! Visit our online store for detailed class descriptions and to reserve your spot!
Questions? Comments? Suggestions for super slick hacker savy classes?
e-mail krystal@as220.org

Resistors-resists the flow of detections.

Find resistors
variable resistors

photo cells
FSR
potentiometers
flex sensors
slide

Dark-high resistance
Light-low resistance

electricity always follows the path of least resistance.

Well, boingboing'ed to be precise.

...and Gizmodo'ed

...and freerang'ed

...and futurismic'ed

...and then apparently I got on Dutch TV (though I haven't seen it yet)

...and then the web site crashed from all the traffic. Go web 2.0! Jalalabad on the world stage! Cool huh?

Want to support the lab that makes this all happen? Donate below:

one time donation:

Become a "friend" for $5 a month:

Yep, fabfi is officially responsible for the net at my house being terrible for about three months... One stray character in the script that checks the WAN for a gateway results in constant resetting of the network when there is no statically entered gateway (and I think router needed to boot with the gateway entered...). Fortunately, dumb luck kept this from affecting the Jalalabad network uplink. We should get around to writing an auto-updater one of these days...

Bug is now fixed (yay). you can fix any 2.1 router by downloading and running the update script HERE. This will take you from 2.1 to the new current version: 2.1.1. For those of you who still need to get from 2.0 -> 2.1 use this updater before you use the one above.

Well today was another nice day in GreenFab. We started the day on Google sketchup we were told to make a rectangle that was 36′x64′ with a height of 150′, a circle that had a diameter of 100′ with height of 25′, and a 12 sided polygon with a diameter of 10′ and a height of 13″. This was our first activity than we made a rectangle with 25′x55′ and a height of 40′. Than after it we had to make a box starting from the corner that was 20′ across and using the push/pull tool we moved it down 20′. After we did that we were told 2 make a box inside the side and make it 1′ deep. After that we made to boxes that was 25′x55′ with a hight of 50′ and the smaller box was 25′x20′ and a hight of 20′. We also copied the shape we did that because we had to do two different things with it. The first thing was to connect the smaller box to the larger box and we did this by grabing it by the corner and moving it to the corner of the larger box. After this was done we learned it could not be separated its like there parters forever. If you ever want to remove the boxes from each other we had to make a component and name it so we could be able to move it, this was the second thing we did. After we played around with the boxes and the tools until lunch.

After lunch we had a had and activity. We had someone come in and talk to us and give us a challenge, for the year we are making new signs and trash bins for our classroom. We are competing against the other two classes in Greenfab and its what ever class recycles the most gets a prize. Well our activity was to go through trash and pick out whats recyclable and whats not. This was yuckey but we mostly had papers so it wasn’t to much of a big deal. That we were separated into groups and started brain storming ideas for it basicly we had ideas to color coat the bins so we now what goes where they were a lot of others. Basilcy how my day was. so bye for now blog heads.

Today I learned how to use the “Off Set Tool” in sketchup.  This tool allows me to make a smaller shape inside inside of a polygon or any other shape. It will be the same shape just a smaller size.  Also I learned that a 12 sided polygon is called a do-decagon. I learned how to copy figures, lines, and shapes using only the ”CTRL” button.  I learned there are different numbers in recycling telling us what type of plastic it will categorized as.  While messing with sketchup I learned if you are trying to make a straight line you can hold the “Shift” button and it will guide the line to what ever point you are connecting it to.  Also I learned how to create a 3-D sphere using the “Follow me Tool”.  During the afternoon Miquele came and informed of a competition we will be a part off.  In this competition we will be creating different ways to organize and dispose our trash and recyclables.

Today at green fab, this morning,  we started off with starting up sketchup and then Carlos gave us a small activity of what we learned so far on sketch up. He told us to make 3 shapes, one was a rectangle, the size for it was 36′ by 64′ with the height of 150′. Then the next one was a circle with a diameter of 100′ and the height of 25′, and the last one was a polygon with 12 sides, which is called do-decagon with the diameter of 10′ and height of 13″. He then told us to rotate the rectangle to 45 degrees and the cylinder to 180 degrees. With the rectangle he taught us how to change the size of one part of the rectangle, during the process he taught us how to copy. He then taught us how to use the offset tool. After the lesson we was able to do anything on our own, which is where i started to build a house i was planning to build. After lunch we had a representative come and talk to us about recycling, once she was finished we was divided into 5 groups and had a little competition, which was trying to show us about recyclable and non recyclable stuff. Then the whole class was split into 2 groups, and i am in the signage group where we find ideas on designs for recycling.

• Electricity always follows the path of least resistance.
• Resistor- resists the flow of electrons.
• Dark- photocell resistance is high.
• light- photocell resistance is low
• you get pay 5 cents to recycle a can

what i did at green fab today is…

• open sketch up
• made a rectangle that was 36′x64′ with a height of 150′
• a circle with a diameter of 100′ a height of 25′
• a polygon with 12sides a diameter of 10′ with a height of 13″

we also learned how to make a component that would snap to the object without staying attached permanently

we did another activity today called garbage auditing .. they split us up into groups of 5 and each group had to sorta out what can be recycled and what is garbage the group that did it the fastest wins a prize! then after we was split up into two groups to come up with a idea for the recycling system at green fab. my team is in charge of designing the waste part of the recycling project.

The rain has started. When it began it was just the slightest pricks of moisture, more a sense of coolness on your skin, welcome after a day of tropical sun. The (full?) moon had risen and could barely be seen through layering clouds. I was outside talking with a medic enjoying the cooling evening breeze and little by little the rain became more and more insistent. We watched a water truck arrive and fill a tank, by the time it left the first pregnant drops were falling. And then the tropical rain let loose.

Down below stretches a sea of lights. On my first night here I was surprised at how many lights there are in the city – I didn’t expect the electrical infrastructure to have been so intact. Doc and I stood looking and imagining the increasing misery of those below who have tarps for wall, ceiling, and floor. There’s not much to say to each other, and after some silence Doc said “this pisses me off. I can’t fix this.” and flicked his cigarette over the wall into the long darkness below.

Neither of us have any reference to what it was like before the earthquake (the locals say “ka-ta-stroph”) though we’ve both been to the slums of India, Africa, and Afghanistan. Tonight’s rain has subsided now – it’s nearly 4AM – just a bit of pattering left. Doc doesn’t expect that there will have been massive slides or buildings disintegrate farther with the rains tonight. Only that today was probably just a little more crappy than yesterday, and we both know there’s much worse to come and no alleviation of suffering in sight.

The lights are still on in the city. I can’t see the moon anymore. It’s begun to rain again.

Tent camp at Place St. Pierre (across from Eglise St. Pierre). Little girl named Valentina who locked on to Kevin, who picked her up and held her as she squealed happily and sucked on her fist. She and her slightly older brother had both waved and giggled at us, and we had been waving and giggling back. She’d diarhea’d down her leg and mother had just washed her. As she was standing on the curb naked and wet with mother dumping water on her a boy walked up next to her and matter-of-factly pissed into the street.

Standing there watching also was a well dressed man who had been a waiter for 31 years at the upscale hotels including the M– which collapsed. He was looking for / visiting with friends. Has a house “a la montagne” and 20 of his extended family died but not his own kids or wife. But out of a job and thinks maybe restaurant might reopen in 2 weeks. Or a month. Or longer. He said that before the earthquake it wasn’t so good either because there have been so many tragedies – the presidents coming and going, and unrest, that tourists didn’t come and the hotels or restaurants would close.

About now the father of Valentina comes over. The white parts of his eyes are legal paper yellow – hepatitis, pronounces Hilda, when I tell her about it later. He says he has no job, he tries to wash cars when they come to park. He wants to show me the place where he, the mother and two kids stay – a triangle pitch tarp and a tarp floor set up not more than 2 feet from the curb where Valentina just had her bath. He says the rains will come and this is all they have, please help, what will they do, she can’t stay here but what can he do. He didn’t ask for money, he wanted me to see. But I had to go, my driver insistently beeping his horn from across the street. I said I was sorry, I don’t know how to help, tell me how you think I can help. He was sorry too, he had no answers, just foreboding about the rains to come.

We’re off to meet with Shawn who is something like a fixer who’s very recently gone security firm. He’s doing security for a company that has the contract to do logistics for the folks searching for expat bodies. One of his guys came back and said that they found two canadians today in the M– hotel but only got one body out. It’s been a month. We saw two Mexican women in orange caving coveralls covered with patches – they are body searches. One woman was much smaller and shorter and we were told that she’d found the largest number of expat bodies. They call her “the snake” (en espanol). Suddenly I realize what the “repatriation of remains” provision is all about on my life insurance. There’s a contract to find and pull out the (insured) expat bodies. I’ll leave the rest unsaid.

This grocery store near the south-eastern end of Rue Delmas. It’s next to the Thai restaurant. Looks reasonably stocked, apparently the prices “c’est normale“, and there’s no apparent damage to the structure.

Arrived Haiti aprox 12:30. Hot. Came in on a fully full 757 and although 3 other flights arrived at approximately the same time in the terminal, immigration and customs was smooth. Just lots of people, and hot. Immigration lady was slightly bored but pleasant. I didn’t have baggage and squeezed right past all the people in the temporary giant armory-style building, had a pleasant bon jour and ca va? with the customs person and then found Kevin waiting for me in possibly the only chair in the terminal. SF guys are resourceful like that I guess.

Shannon (that’s a dude) was waiting outside with a rental truck/van. He came in a month ago driving in from DR and has since seen the whole city. Drives kind of like a crazy Afghan especially when he drops a cheesy poof and has to go digging around in his lap to find it. We zipped about and I lived up to the stereotypical asian with a camera. Except Kevin has one too.

Here’s a few views from the first outing that day. We also went to a grocery store (“market”) on Rue Delmas which was completely intact and had everything you’d expect – staples, processed stuff, produce, meat, bread, toiletries, etc. And an entire wall of liquor and beer, which is kind of a weird sight since I’m sort of used to Afghanistan now. Don’t seem to have selected those photos, maybe tomorrow. Went out after night fall too but pics on other camera. Tired now. Enjoy photos.

Why bother to give your product a model number if it doesn't mean anything?

TrendNet seems to have the answer, as their TEW-652BRP sports completely different internals from V1 to V2 and, of course, V2 is built with a Realtek chip that won't run OpenWRT. So much for the $33 option. Next up, the $35 (after rebate) ASUS WL-520GU with USB...

Looks like a quick trip for the second half of March is on. Logan’s gonna meet me there late March and I’m relieved that he can stay through the first half of the beginner’s photojournalism course that will kick off in April.

A ton of stuff to do for that — I gotta vet the Afghan who will run the course and settle on the camera model, and check on the number of working computers. And oh, actually find professional or skilled amateurs willing to mentor the students from afar (do you take photos for a living or hobby? Are you willing to trade email with an Afghan to review their photos and offer advice on improving their skills? Email me!)

Also got the Amazon wish list for the Jalalabad Public Library going. The fab labbers are making custom book cases and study areas on the shopbot. They’ve been practicing with stools, cabinets, and shoe racks. The library is going to start off modestly in a small room next to the fab lab at the sharwali. The library is something that the labbers suggested themselves, in addition to books they want to loan things like cameras and laptops too.

Mostly I’m going to check up on things especially lots of reports that amount to people not getting along.

Well, if you’re going to be in Af / Jbad and wanna get together or have things to check up on, send me some mail.

Last Saturday Karsten Joost and Axel Grischow organized the first meet-up in Germany of people interested in FabLab. There was room for 40 people in the venue, and that number quickly filled up. In fact there was a waiting list for people who would have liked to attend as well. People came from different cities, apart von Bremen, there were people from Berlin, Hamburg, Aachen, Nürnberg and Düsseldorf, as well as from other places.

Creating the programme on the spot

Karsten and Axel had invited several of us from the Netherlands. Peter Troxler (to talk about business development), Bart Kempinga (FabLab Groningen, and how to get from idea to product), Petra Koonstra (creating a venue for the creative industry at Het Paleis in Groningen) and me (Dutch FabLabs as a network, and community building)

In true barcamp style the program of sessions was decided collectively at the start of the day. It was a good an varied programme. Talking both about organizational aspects of starting a FabLab as well hands-on topics, as well as a demo-space where different equipment was available to give a try.

I thoroughly enjoyed the day as well as the cool people. I hope that this may be the start of the emergence of a range of FabLabs in Germany.

My slides on the network effect of FabLabs and community building (partly in German, but mostly in English) can be seen below, as well as the pictures I took.

Existen diversos sistemas para escanear objetos tridimensionales, como el Milk Scanner, Modela Scanner y el Scanner Projector.

1. Milk Scanner – WorkShop (Carlos Castro Prieto, Anthony B. )

Milk scaned layers and vectors from Anthony B. on Vimeo.

En este workshop se escaneo una máscara de Gas de un tamaño aproximado de 40 x 20cm, que fue sumergida en agua con tinte negro, sobre una superficie sólida en una cubeta de plástico. Para la iluminación básica usamos un foco de 200w – 400w situado por encima del objeto. Para las fotos usamos una cámara profesional Canon EOS 400D DIGITAL con una lente de 51mm. En total se tomaron 97 fotos de alta resolución. La separación de entre capas fue de 1mm.

Materiales: objeto a escanéar, líquido (leche, vinagre, Coca-Cola o agua con un tinte negro) , cámara, recipiente y algún tipo de iluminación, ya que el objeto no puede tener sombras si no puede perder la forma real.
Proceso: se sumerge el objeto o partes de él en el líquido que genera contornos del objeto. El nivel de líquidos tiene que ir subiendo proporcionalmente (1mm ~ 1cm) siempre dependiendo del detalle que queramos obtener. Terminado el proceso procedemos a vectorizar las imágenes y obtendremos las líneas de contorno con las que podremos reconstruir el volumen 3D en formato digital.
Modelado 3D: realizado con Max 2009 o 2010: Antes de nada unimos todas las capas en una sola haciendo un (attach) y lo convertimos en editablePoly. Los vértices nos servirán para crear una malla aproximada (en este modelo no hace falta seguir ningún patrón de malla). Separamos los polígonos creados del objeto y ocultamos el objeto anterior ya que los vértices ya no los vamos a necesitar.
Impresión 3D: finalmente el modelo debe presentar una malla triangular (en Max podemos usar un modificador llamado “subDivide”) que transforma la malla en una malla triangular. El modelo debería presentar las dos caras externa y interna. las paredes deberían de ser de un grosor de unos 2mm como mínimo (para que puedan ser impresos sin dificultad). Todos los splines deberían de estar cerrados ya que puede presentar algún error en la impresión. Y finalmente exportamos modelo con un formato “.STL” , “.3Ds” o bien “.OBJ”. Eviar a IMPRIMIR!

2. Modela Scanner:

Preparación: Primero se coloca el objeto a escanear en la base del Modela. Se debe tener cuidado en en que no se mueva y de que no sea de un material muy blando, para evitar errores de escaneado.
Escaneado: se utilizó el Dr. Picza. Primero se deberá indicar los límites del objeto, luego indicar a que distancia se tomarán los datos. (Resolución máxima 10 000 puntos por mm2), indicar la altura mínima en la cota Z inferior y finalmente la altura máxima que indica la posición donde será registrado el límite Z superior. ESCANEADO!
El resultado final final es una malla en 3D, extensión *.pix.
Modelado: La malla resultante fue modificada utilizando Rhinoceros, pero puedes utilizar el software que prefieras que soporte la siguiente extensiones: DXF, BMP, VRML,STL, 3DMF, IGES, Grayscale, Grupo puntual.
Impresión 3D: puedes utilizar diversas máquinas como: 3D Printer , milling machine, Laser Cuter, etc..

3. Scanner Projector

Todos los pasos se encuentran detallados en Instructables, donde Kyle Mcdonald explica como hacer una Structured-Light-3D-Scanner utilizando un proyector, una cámara digital y Processing.

We have been using  3 D scanner.

English version below.

FabTafel in Groningen
Op woensdag 10 maart is de volgende FabTafel. We gaan naar Groningen. Het FabLab Groningen gaat officieel op 31 maart open, en dat is een geweldige mijlpaal. Alle reden dus om op 10 maart alvast naar Groningen te gaan om het FabLab te bewonderen en Bart, Peter, Thuur en andere betrokkenen van harte te feliciteren.

FabTafels beginnen altijd om 15:00 uur. Laat tevoren even weten of je komt (mail ton@fablab.nl).

FabTafels gaan altijd door, ongeacht wie er komt of niet. De volgende data, na 10 maart, zijn op 21 april, 2 juni, 14 juli, 25 augustus, 6 oktober, 17 november, 5 januari (2011). Telkens vanaf 15:00 uur.

Tot ziens in Groningen!

Sneak preview, photos by Lykle de Vries.

FabTable in Groningen
Wednesday March 10th will see a new edition of the FabTable. This time we will be meeting up in Groningen. The brand new FabLab Groningen will officially open its doors on March 31st, which is a great milestone for the Dutch FabLab community. This is an excellent reason to come to Groningen on March 10th, to get your first glimpse of the new FabLab Groningen, and congratulate Bart, Peter, Thuur and others who made it happen.

FabTables always start at 15:00hrs. Let me know if you will be attending (mail ton@fablab.nl).

FabTables always take place regardless of who is able to attend or not. The next FabTables, after March 10th will be on April 21st, June 2nd, July 14th, August 25th, October 6th, November 17th and January 5th (2011).

See you in Groningen!

Neil, Sherry, Amon, and I went to the National Science Foundation headquarters in Arlington last week. Neil gave a talk for their Distinguished Lecturer Series and there was an after party, I mean after meeting, for people from various organizations interested in bringing Fab Labs into multiple environments in the USA. We were also joined by Fabbers Jim Jannisse (Wisconsin) and David Richardson (Ohio) from the USFLN, and Kelly Snook from NASA Goddard (and a graduate of the How to Make Almost Anything class at MIT).

I was hoping to wait until I got a link to the video from Neil’s presentation but it’s been over a week so all you get are some photos. For anyone in the Boston area, Neil is giving a similar talk at the Museum of Science on March 10, 2010.

This was the beginning if a whirlwind trip, including some amazing meetings with people interested in helping with Fab Lab Afghanistan as well as site scouting the Fab Lab DC site in North Cap (I’m already late on the site report, hopefully I’ll get to that this weekend).

Well, I’m still not sure what happened to the blog because it involved scary mysql database stuff.  And I did some wordpress updates at the same time, leading to a rather pronounced down time.  But thanks to Jeff, the blog is back and everything seems fine.  Whew!  Jeff’s fee was super steep, two Tootsie Rolls, some congee, and a cup of water – but I managed to scrape it together.

I have a lot to catch up on, having just returned hours ago from several days in DC and lots and lots of fascinating meetings.  But first some things from around the fab world that I would have pointed at if the blog were up:

Soshanguve Fab Lab moved to a new building.  The empty room didn’t look a lot different but the new work areas after the move looks super inviting!  If you’re at all in the area now is a great time to visit.  That center table in particular is just screaming for you to plop yourself down at to make something cool.  In characteristic Soshanguve style, they’re doing just that and jumping headlong in to 3D scanning, modeling, milling and molding.

In Afghanistan, we’ve started making plans for the public library that will be in a room next to the fab lab. We’ve set up an Amazon book wishlist which is being filled by local Afghans. They’re spreading the world among themselves to select the books; we’ll need to find ways to fulfill their requests. The selections so far are really interesting and run the gamut from basic English to computer and networking to anger management and conflict resolution to business marketing and fundraising.

Some of you know that Nadya is spearheading an effort to fund and link with a Haitian organization to bring a Fab Lab to Haiti. We’re having lots of various meetings with different groups at MIT but she’ll always welcome more input or help. Go see the site to keep up — Nadya’s running a blog on Haiti related events and information (Boston area biased).