Kicking off our Make it on Mondays series we have arranged for a brief overview of 4 common robotics groups; VEX, Lego, FIRST, & SeaPerch, including what some of the local Putnam County programs are doing.
Area 30, Putnam County 4-H, and the DePauw Robotics Club will be there talking about what they’re doing with Robotics, along with some information about other regional competitions. If you’ve heard about VEX kits or Lego Mindstorms in Putnam County; or maybe just heard/wondered what is FIRST Robotics or SeaPerch from friends in other parts of Indiana, we’ll try to have some more information for you at this event.
This will be an open question/sharing session at the end, so if you have information you’d like to share about other Putnam county robotics groups please let us know or simply show up and share it with everyone! We’ll be meeting in the Community Room at Area 30 next Monday November 3rd at 7pm where you can see one of the robots that have competed at regional events.
In a recent trip down to Berea, KY I got to see firsthand how the Arts community is starting to converge with the making culture, kind of putting the STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering Arts, Math) in to STEM!
Artisan using a loom to create fabric with a weave/pattern for the upcoming Christmas season. There is a fairly complex mechanism that moves the flying shuttle and puts the proper heddles in place at the right time.
Berea of course has been known for years as an artisan center and you can see the maker culture/impact there even if it is not always called that. Artists have always been makers at heart, you only have to watch the mechanics of someone weaving fabric or tapestry in a large loom or listen to someone describing the pickling process when silver soldering a necklace or bracelet to realize there’s a fair amount of STEM that artists can use in their craft. One studio I was in had a period table of the elements on the wall next to their casting area.
One studio in Berea creates pewter casting molds using table-top CNC machines and 3D printers.
What I found interesting was how the personal fabrication tools that makers are embracing are being used by artists, and vice-versa. Smaller CNC machines, laser cutters, and 3D printers are all being used to create art, but then anyone that’s been to a Maker Faire knows/has seen that already. That jewelry or napkin holder may be made with something that could be built in makerspace!
There’s a core group of Castlemakers that are working towards creating a more permanent place, a makerspace, for us to create things. And to hold some of the parts and fabrication tools we’ve started collecting, including some best shared, that would allow people to make things – young and old. If you’re interested in helping, send us an email.
If you’re interested in finding out more about making your own artwork, Berea now has a series of art making workshops that you can sign up for. The biggest is their Festival of Learnshops in July, but there’s an upcoming Holiday series called Make It, Take It, Give It that starts the end of November which looks to be really good also.
On Labor Day weekend we had our first public Shovercraft showing – what a great time for the kids!! A huge thanks to the Greencastle Farmer’s Market for their assistance. And for letting us shove the kids down Washington next to them while they were on Indiana Street downtown that Saturday.
All of the craft hovered, some of them maybe a little too well if you look through the pictures! The kids loved it & the part I really enjoyed was the excitement seeing the kids helping each other and showing those walking by how their craft worked, even letting some of the other kids see what it was like to ride a leaf blower powered hovercraft.
There was a little on-the-spot fabrication work needed on some of the craft, part of the experience, but they worked remarkably well. I’m setting up a photo album of photos, but there’s also a lot of pictures on the Farmer’s Market page and a fair number of pictures and even a video on Facebook from some of the people there.
The Shovercraft pit area next to the Farmer’s Market.
We even took one of the craft down to the Bloomington Makevention later in the day and did some runs in their parking lot. Not as far as the twinkie cannon that was going off near our launch point, but still another fun event. Bloominglabs Makevention was an incredible event by itself, I’ll post more information on that event later.
Next up for Castlemakers: Pumpkin projectiles. Well we actually have more in mind than that, maybe some hydroponics & RC/electronics projects are being tossed around. Show up for our next general club meeting (9/28 @1:30 pm in the Community Room above Eli’s Books downtown) and find out more!!
Bloominglabs, a makerspace in Bloomington Indiana, has their Makevention this coming Saturday, August 30th, from 10 am to 4 pm. It’s at the Bloomington, Indiana convention center and you can read more about the event here: http://makevention.org/
Last year they had FIRST & the FIRST Lego League robotics equipment there, it looks like the local high school team at least has a booth this year. Should be a good opportunity to see some interesting maker projects and if you’re interested in robotics get a feel for what’s involved in fielding a FIRST robotics team.
I’m working on Making speaker series this fall to start in October in Putnam County. The first topic will be on the different robotics team competitions – including have our local VEX robotics team speak about what they’re doing.
There’s also an upcoming Robotics Encounter down in Scottsburg Indiana for kids in grades 3-12 on September 27th. It’s sponsored by the local 4H/ Purdue Extension office down there, but out-of-towners are encouraged for the 10 am to 3 pm workshop. You can read more about it in the flyer or call the Floyd County Extension office at 812.948.5470.
Our hovercraft teams have been hard at work & we’ve got a 4th team that will be joining us at the upcoming event. Several teams now have prototype shovercrafts running, there are links off the project page. Our public showing/competition will be at the Greencastle Farmer’s Market in late August.
Quick reminder for the shovercraft teams that we’ll be meeting as a whole group again Wednesday August 13th, 7 pm, at the Southside Community Center (605 Crown Street).
Usually we think about kids making things, but the other day I realized that un-making things can be every bit as important. Maybe it’s how we begin tinkering & building things, learning how existing things work by taking them apart.
It started with my daughter and her friend asked to watch a movie. I suggested they go out in the garage instead to tear apart some equipment that I’d gotten for our maker group to build things with. The old equipment was made mostly of 80/20 extruded aluminum (some call it erector set material for adults) and it was held together with lots of things that needed to be unscrewed and disassembled.
I was a bit uneasy thinking that it wouldn’t go over well. I wasn’t sure they would like it. But turns out I was wrong… they loved it!! 45 minutes later there was nothing but a pile of pieces laying on the garage floor!
In the process, I learned something from watching/helping the kids take it apart. I really never thought about how to use a screwdriver, you just sort of well… do it. But then in watching it hit me at some point I must have learned from someone else.
Little things like knowing how the blade or hex wrench should go into the screw head, keeping the screwdriver straight up so it doesn’t slip out and get the best torque – even using the long side for leverage with an allen wrench to break the screw loose are things that is best experienced. With some occasional guidance and encouragement you also don’t give up on the task and keep learning. Kinesthetic, hands on learning isn’t the same as reading it in a book or watching a video. And the girls started encouraging each other and before long I was hearing “I get to do that one…” – and they were having fun while doing it!!
So get out and help some kids take things apart. Building things is good fun too – don’t miss the opportunity to help them learn the tactile and hands-on portion of learning to use tools and components whether it’s making or ‘un-making’ things. Goodness knows there’s not as much in schools anymore.
In fact, we’re going to host a tear down session of more equipment for the Castlemakers group this Saturday @ 11 am. We got lucky enough to get more old equipment to tear apart. Join us if you’d like – I can’t promise how long after that it will stay assembled, but we’re going to have fun tearing it all apart!!
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I’ve been negligent by not talking about some other maker events going on here in Greencastle. Putnam County Library has been having Maker Tuesdays – short 1-2 hour events at the Public Library. I’ve only seen a flyer on it posted at the library but I was able to find something on the Putnam County Library online calendar. There’s another event coming up Tuesday July 29th, or stop by and I’m sure they can give you more information.
The mentors have met after our last group meeting and we decided on a Shovercraft as our first group build project. It looks like there will be at least 3 groups of 3-4 kids building one, then we’ll have a competition/race in August.
Our next meeting is Thursday June 12 at 7pm in the Community Room above Eli’s Books just off the square downtown. Please feel free to join us, we have 4 mentors willing to give their time so we can investigate, design, and create these craft for the competition. Even if you haven’t been involved so far, you’re welcome to show up and have your 9-14 year old daughter/son participate in this youth-centered maker club event.
Keep watching our Projects page for more details on how the team builds are going & when we’ll have the challenge/competition for the groups in August.
Some of the younger kids at the kickoff meeting looking at possible projects we could make.
Thanks to all that made it Monday night at Crown Equipment to the meeting on creating a Putnam County maker group for youth. Seemed like a fairly good turnout for a first time meeting. We had 21 people there by my count – enough to get something going!
We briefly covered what the maker movement is, categories of possible projects, the making process, and some ideas for projects groups could do. There were also some Arduino boards & shields, a small hand built catapult, various magazines full of possible projects, a 3D printed chess set, and lots of pictures of maker groups and built projects. Several people indicated they wanted to come, had conflicts, and to count them in – I’ll get you the info presented. If you’re reading this and interested, drop me an email and I can also send you a copy of the presentation.
People afterwards filling out interest forms.
We also gave out some forms to the kids with a listing of possible project categories and a form for possible mentors to list their knowledge/expertise areas. I’ve now got a stack that is apparently bigger than the attendance – some families only were able to send one parent and several people there were representing other families too. It’s going to take me a few days to get through these and compile the list. If you were there at the meeting please be patient until I can read through & summarize the results. If you weren’t there, here’s a copy of the youth interest form and the mentor form. You’ll have to print these out and email them back – or heck maybe in true maker fashion maybe someone can make an online form!!
Dayton Hamvention Slow Scan Video Transmission from Balloon at 1000 feet.
Next weekend (5/16-18) in Dayton Ohio will be the annual Dayton Hamvention. With about 25,000 people attending that are interested in building ‘stuff’ and over 2000 outside flea market spaces (never mind all the indoor commercial vendors there) it is truly an amazing event for makers. This year’s theme even reflects that – “Makers… the future of Ham Radio.”
Many people when they hear about Amateur Radio (or Ham Radio) Operator imagine an elderly guy with a green visor hunched over a telegraph key. Matter of fact several years ago Jay Leno pitted teenagers using a cellphone against some amateur radio operators using morse code to see who was fastest at sending a message (the ham radio operators won).
Amateur radio these days is far from that doing everything from building and launching satellites, providing emergency communications during catastrophic and public events, bouncing signals off the moon to talk with other ham radio operators and much, much more. Many of our astronauts are ham operators and use the amateur radio station in the International Space Station to talk to classrooms. There was a group when I was in Terre Haute that was trying to put together a classroom broadcast to the space station -I’ve often thought that it would be a good educational experience for kids in Putnam county to talk live to an astronaut in space.
If you’re interested in finding out more about amateur radio in Putnam County, George Edenfield (KB9RZK) would be a good person to contact. He’s the IT person at Putnam County Public Library & you can reach him at 765.653.5327. I’m not longer ‘radio-active’ but still have my license and use the skills in electronics/home-brew projects/fabricating things that I learned as an amateur radio operator. Or head over to Dayton next weekend and gawk to learn more. If you’ve never been you’ll definitely be impressed. – Chris (N9VFD)
VEX Robotics Competition Exhibition in Greencastle, Indiana
Don’t forget that this Saturday, April 5th, from 10am to 1 pm in the Community Room there will be a robotics competition exhibition at the Area 30 Career Center in Greencastle. A flyer for the event describes a little more on it and the public is welcome!
Club Cyberia, a Makerspace in Indianapolis, is having an open project day this Saturday from 1-6 pm. I’m heading over to visit & to learn more about how their model works – update later!
