Weekend event + Scorpions!

So I went to a weekend camping event thingy (a larp, if you must know) and upon returning from abusing my body and not sleeping for 3 days, I drank WAAAAY too many scorpion bowls.

A scorpion bowl is made with 151, gin, vodka, rum, dark rum, grenadine, pineapple, orange and grapefruit juice. (If you are interested in making your own, that is 2/2/2/2/2/1/13/9/2 parts. Chill the bowl and have lots of ice.) While my household has 8 people in it, we did end up making 10 bowls through the night. As you can guess, I was so hungover I could not function. So... give me another day and we will return to pictures of a almost completely functional steampunk pacemaker.

Project: Steampunk Pacemaker

Parts for the heart shown below. Ordered a squishy heart. Did a bit of work cutting gear sections out of the clock movement. Made some gauges. Added a mini-electrostatic piece to a gear set. Have a motor that is slow speed/high torque. Made a leyden jar. (seriously, if you don't know what a leyden jar is, look it up. it's awesome) Collected a bunch of brass 'stuff'.

Project: Steampunk Pacemaker

The box is finished. Reclaimed wood, glued like crazy and then sanded, stained and finished. The front is actually a picture frame I found at S&S for $2. The hinges are there forever, but the brass corners may have to go as I try to attach everything inside. Basically, there will be alot of holes so I can make everything SUPER secure.

This is just to show where on the harness it will fit.

Project: Steampunk Pacemaker

Just a cut or two with the scissors to finish the harness I salvaged from the bad shoulder holster pattern.  Rather than making a belt myself, which would have required a 1.5 hour drive for materials, I just used old belts. Extra pieces to connect them were made from scrap leather. Rivets were... whatever I bought. To be honest, I have no idea what I should've used, but I've been wearing this for an hour and nothing has popped off yet. The piece on your right used to be the holster's counter weight. I'm going to add some straps and use it to hold vintage tools.

Project: Blogger burnout

So, in honor of 4/20, I've burnt out reading the 100 or so blogs I have been trying to follow.

I really like to see bloggers having a community with back and forth across blogs and such. I haven't really been getting that though, except for a few very interesting and eclectic group of people. What I intend to do about that is blow up my list of favorite blogs and start anew. Chances I will end of following the core group that seems to have arisen, but please comment in here so I don't miss you! Also, because I tend to watch so many blogs, I can't always comment, but that doesn't mean I'm not watching! It's just that if I comment more than once/3 days I would end up spending ALL my free time on here. (;

Likewise, if any of you find other bloggers who enjoy being part of this community and seem to being along our interesting bent of randomness, tell me about them and I will check them out.

And a pic for the day: And electrical box I made a year ago that acts as a more functional power strip.

Project: Tire Trap a.k.a. GET OFF MY LAWN, YOU KIDS!

As mentioned in the last post, some jerk keeps hitting my garden boxes and breaking them. This project didn't take very long, but I'm happy with it none the less.

Step 1: Rebar get!

 Step 2: Bend the ends. I don't have an anvil or anything, but two salvaged sledge hammers work just fine.

 Step 3: Grind them to a certain sharpness.

 Mmmmm, sharp.

 Step 4: Place around box at sidewall height.

 Step ?: Profit. If someone hits them on the side, then it should slash their sidewall. If they hit it head on, then it should puncture their tire pretty well.

 A testament to the party. Two recycle bins filled to the top with handles of booze, snacks and the bags to transport them in.

Project: Party

So, interrupting my project time was a theme party thrown at my house.  It was 1920's themed, so my friend and I decided to make the entrance into a front for a speakeasy, which would be in the basement. We built some shelves with hide the stairs, a counter which flips up (after you say the password, of course) (also, the jar of animals crackers is screwed to it), false walls to confuse the people who had been to my house before, installed an olde phone and lined the place with vintage posters for candy and such.

This is the counter that flips up (hinge in the middle). The stairs are directly behind the shelves. After are the only two photos I took in one of the basement rooms. 80 people or so. I am still hungover and it is two days later...

 Since we had two actual bartenders coming to serve all night, I asked them what they wanted and delivered that too. Fixed the sink, which required some jury rigging since the jerks just hack sawed through the feed pipes. AND the pipe sizes were old school and did not fit any of the new adapters. So I stuck two adapters together to get the size I needed with a compression fitting.

Then I found out the next morning that some jerk hit one of the three raised bed gardens with their car. Update tomorrow on how I'm going to deal with that. Also, though I don't comment every day (mostly due to hangovers), I definitely check out all the people I'm following daily. Thinking enough to type is hard, though.

Project: Steampunk Pacemaker

So I already had the materials and tools for starting the harness, so I got to work on it. I figured I would make shoulder holster and then add on a few straps for extra stability. That way I could also have it hold a steampunk gun should I ever make one. (it seems that modded nerf guns are in every steampunk pic I see)

I grabbed a pattern from the leather working store in the area and got to work. For those of you that have never done this before, it's not really that hard if you have a good pattern. Cut the stuff out with a sharp knife of leather scissors. Trim the edges, slick the edges, made a pretty cut 1/4" inside the edge, dye, seal, done. Took me a more hours than I wanted because this is my second leather project.

Problem #1: The shoulder straps angle out like wings. I even tried wetting and stretching the leather, to no avail. I think I'm going to try and attach them to a belt that goes all the way around my chest and have the pieces of the harness act like suspenders to it. I'll try that out tonight. (if you haven't seen this type of holster, the gun holster gets added to the small piece under my left arm. The big hanging piece on the other side is a counter weight that you put clips/bullets on)

The pattern is in the pic, so if you wanted to try this, you would know to make it out of paper and try it on first. (;

Next project

So I'm thinking for the next project I move away from just simple woodwork and try something harder. I'm kind of into alot of the steampunk sites I see, but most of the things they wear as "devices" are just plain crap with gears and bedazzles glued on the outside.  What I'm thinking of will have moving gears inside. Since a friend of mine received a pacemaker, I'd thought that would be something worth making.

Design wise, I'm thinking a leather harness with what is basically a shadowbox mounted over the chest. Inside would be all the visible workings. I'm going to include a motor or pump in there that actually works (running off of batteries) so that there is some manner of "Wow, this thing could've existed! Watch it go!"

Feel free to throw ideas in comments. I enjoy brainstorming for these projects more than I do building them. (;

ps- what is steampunk? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b75vrsoT8qM

Hotbox: complete

Here is my hot box! All recycled material save for the screws. The sides are pieces of broken plexiglass and the top pieces are part of a full window that had a broken frame. Handles and hinges scavenged off of doors and such found on the side of the road. All found wood.

I ended up painting it before I put it in the yard, but then forgot my camera to take a pic. (;

Hotbox

   For my next project, I think I'm going to work on a hotbox for the garden. A hotbox is basically a mini-greenhouse used for younger plants to slowly get used to the outside. I'm thinking one flat window on top and another at a 45 degree angle, both of which can open up.

   Luckly, the streets of this city are filled with enough of people's junk that I should be able to scavenge everything but the screws I need. Yay, recycling.

Workbench

So, I worked for a while to get the bottom shelf on the table, which stabilizes the table as well as provides a place to put bins and wood, etc.  As I was cutting, I realized I missed on important tool...


So I improvise. I remove the guard for the circular saw and pretend it is the right tool for the job. Luckly, the goggles stop all the shards of wood from cutting out my eyes. Did I mention they are H's Girl Genius goggles?  Once it is all cut, I try and shove it in. ::count it::  That's when I find it is exactly 1/8" too big to fit through the legs of the table. I dismantle the side, crying about my perfect squares.

Since it is scrap wood, I find that it is oddly shaped and I need to pull it out (which is not safe) to cut it again. Yay, second try works and I screw it all in.  Some time with the electric sander and it's finished!


Behold and Tremble!!!

Testing

First post.

I'm making this blog to be my building projects website, plus other things about building projects in general.

Run, cowards.