Category: Tools

Turning Bowls

Turning Bowls

I bought a "luxury selection of exotic wood blanks" from ebay to try turning some bowls. Some of them worked! Bowl 1 + Bowl 2 These were a success, although I think bowl 2 is better from a shape and f…

Afternoon Experiment with Veneer

Afternoon Experiment with Veneer

A friend, Sandy, suggested trying laser cutting wood veneer (he has plans for a complex design). However, I’d not tried that before, and it sounded like an interesting idea. I’ve often watched people…

Lasercutting Lathe Toolbox

Lasercutting Lathe Toolbox

One problem with the lathe is I now have a whole set of chisels lying around the place, which is kinda annoying. I spent yesterday designing a quick tool support to attach to the lathe bench in Fusion…

Boring 3d Printing: Ceiling Cable Covers

Boring 3d Printing: Ceiling Cable Covers

Time for some slightly boring, but useful, 3d printing. The Problem When I wired the house, I was planning on adding ceiling mounted wifi access points. However, in the end, I didn't use them. So we w…

Making a Pinecil case

Making a Pinecil case

I got one of these nifty wee Pinecil USB-C soldering irons for Christmas They're really quite cool: temperature controlled by an embedded RISC V processor, USB-C powered (using modern high power suppl…

Upgrading my Jewellery Kiln

Upgrading my Jewellery Kiln

I have a small "Prometheus Pro-1 PRG" Jewellery kiln for experimentation and artwork. Its a programmable kiln, which allows you to have programmes with multiple cycles of heating and cooling over time…

New Tools!

New Tools!

I've been struggling with a pair of worn out snips for all my snipping/wire stripping needs for years. For some reason I didn't realise that I could just.. order something better. I've now rectified t…

New Tool! Jewellery Kiln

New Tool!  Jewellery Kiln

I've wanted one of these for ages, so I decided to buy one a couple of weeks ago. I went for a "Prometheus Pro-1 PRG" which is a small, comparatively cheap desktop kiln: Its ideal for a beginner. I pa…

Boiling Water in a Vacuum at Room Temperature

Boiling Water in a Vacuum at Room Temperature

My Vacuum pump and chamber arrived! I went for a Bacoeng 3 CFM Single Stage Oil Filled Rotary Vane Pump (BA-1) and a slightly more expensive tempered-glass-topped 6.8L vacuum chamber. I could have got…

My Wanhao Duplicator i3 Plus 3D Printer Upgrades

My Wanhao Duplicator i3 Plus 3D Printer Upgrades

This is inspired by the "Prusa i3" range of 3D Printers. Even though its cheaper, this one still has a solid metal structure. I've heavily upgraded it: It would probably have been cheaper to simply bu…