Endor Observation Post

The story of a kids playhouse

Some years ago, after the pool was wrecked by the weight of a record snow year, we dismantled a part of the deck. Suffering from the common makers sickness that prevents you from throwing away good material, I stored all that wood away. Here's the pile after we got it back out and inventoried what we had to work with:

The only new wood was the 4 columns and the cross braces at the base. To ensure (completely overkill) stability I went for a design where all the columns are leaning inward.

For extra QA and on the spot design-validation, my dad was part of the build. By working with him him when I was a kid, I learned to build and to problem solve. I always loved building things with him.

Here is the playhouse partway during construction:

Since we finished the playhouse some days ago, the kids have played in it every day. Like a moths to a flame all the kids in the street were also sucked into the playhouse. It is one happy place.

Now let's renovate our old bathroom...

LEGO Wear Test #2 - Design

I have the basic design  for the second LEGO wear test machine.  Here is a prototype made with Castilene plastic:

The result will be a long rig that will hold all 10 pairs of LEGO bricks to be tested simultaneously.  The parts will be made of machined metal fitting the brick shape as precisely as possible.  One thing that I learned from the first test is that it takes a lot of strength to hold those bricks, which is why I'm overkilling this one.

The bottom part is composed of two halves enabling the rig to either hold tight or release the piece completely.

Following comments that many viewers/readers have left, here are the new requirements:

• Use a rotation motion to remove the LEGO bricks.
• Keep the test speed at 10 seconds per iteration to prevent heat from friction.
• Test 10 sets at the same time.
• Test bricks from different eras.
• Once the LEGO bricks have fallen the first time, rotate them 180 degrees to continue testing until it fails again.
• Run the machine in the shed to keep the noise down.
• Have a way to query the test status while it's running.

Not following comments that some viewers/readers have left:

• This will not solve global warming
• I will keep playing with LEGO bricks
• My accent should not improve before the next test

One thing I'm leaving out is to have many control points and this test will [again] only count the iterations.  I initially wanted to monitor forces and current but it makes no sense with this simultaneous test. Next time...

For the test I've done my best to select bricks from 3 eras.  The new ones (3 pairs) were the easiest to find while the 2 pairs from the mid 70s posed a challenge.  It started with one pair I took from a set  bought at the flea market.  It was the set #370 from the mid 70s.  Looking at those two white bricks I noticed that they had a unique casting mark on one side.  After a lot of digging, I finally found two bricks with similar marks.  In a very non-scientific moment I declared that this unique feature probably means that they're from the same era.  Shoot me.

Now that the 10 pairs of bricks have been selected they are set aside until the test and other bricks are used during the rig's development.  Also, in a wave of madness, I might even run this new test twice with the side effect that I'm slowly destroying all the 2x3 bricks in the house.

Test design & LiveTankGame

Well, while I'm working on the design of the new LEGO test rig (see test1), I'm getting back into the tank project.  My generic goal for this long term project is to design a table top robotic game that will be a cross between a live card game and robotics.  So far I will have two tank platforms to test all the robotic modules so that I can prototype the gameplay based around those features.

TA1 (aka: whydontyouworkyou...)

You may ask yourself “Where the heck are you going with this?”, and that is a good question since I don't have a final answer yet.   You see, I like building stuff and I like cool-unusual-geeky-things that I can't afford so, many times, if I want something I have a tendency to build it.  My latest crazy idea came during the last Christmas vacation when my wife and I started playing a live card game called Android Netrunner.  No it has nothing to do with mobile phones.

The box

I found this game so cool that I had this crazy idea to reinvent the same level of gameplay using robots instead of cards. Why? Well... why not? Sooooo this is going to take a long time and I have to start by testing what kind of electronic interactions/capabilities the tanks can have. Once I have enough working features I will design the basic gameplay around them and build the two game tanks. Like I said... long term and so geeky that it technically falls into the nerd realm.

Here is a short update: The mobility base is composed of a robotic tank kit and a homemade DC motor driver. The motor driver PCB still needs a bit of redesign but it's functional for now and that... is good enough. Here I am building one of the two tank kits:

For now, the tank is controlled using an Android phone via bluetooth and I'm ready to start testing the other features like the laser, IR proximity sensors, light sensors, Ultrasonic range finder, etc...

Starting now, I will also tweet the updates using the hashtag #livetankgame.  

3 Great Rockets Moments

Watching the SpaceX March 7th (2013) Grasshopper test, I realized that this was one of the best rocket video moments I had seen.  Now, the minimum I could do was to list my [new] top 3.  This list is not chosen based on the historical importance of the event but on the emotional impact of seeing a rocketry  rare and amazing moment.


1
Apollo 11 landing sequence
This one may sound like an easy choice but, having read so much about the Apollo program and understanding the level of complexity of the events leading to a moon landing, this video makes me sit at the edge of my seat every time.  Especially with the added stress of the 1201-02 alarm that almost forced them to abort the landing. (info about the 1201 alarm)

2 
Space Shuttle SRB Flight
This is a long one to watch but it's worth it. The camera is attached to the top of one of the Space Shuttle Solid Rocket Boosters (SRB).  The strange feeling of seeing the ground 'fall' away at this ridiculous speed is hard to beat.  After the noisy first part of the takeoff, there is a change in the sound while the rocket leaves the dense atmosphere followed by the silence after the separation.  But the most awesome part is when the booster enters back into the dense air with the eerie moaning-sound of the empty cylinder growing into a full roar while the rocket is slowing down to terminal velocity.

3
SpaceX Grasshopper test
This video just climbed into my top three list for the simple reason that it is filmed from the air.  This was done probably by using a sort of radio controlled camera platform (e.g. Quad-copter).  It is a strange feeling, to virtually be there and float next to this monster while it just stands in mid-air.  You expect a rocket to either do nothing on the pad or go full throttle but to see this delicate precision, now that is crazy cool.  SpaceX made it look like they do this every day... but wait.. they ARE doing this every day.  Go SpaceX!

LEGO all worn out

As suggested by Christopher Gaul, I took some macro(ish) pictures of the wear patterns on both the studs of the bottom LEGO brick and the inside walls and tubes of the top LEGO brick.

Clear marks are left on the sides of the studs (bottom LEGO)

The small ridges on the inside walls (top LEGO) are visibly worn down.  There is also damage to the tubes and even the walls themselves.

Here are the 2 pictures in full resolution (sorry for the low quality) without the notes:

CSI case #66531