June was a pretty busy month at the CabFabLab; a lot of students visited us to fabricate parts for their school assignments and graduation projects. July is always very quiet since a lot of people are enjoying the nice weather and some well deserved time-off from school and work projects. The machines at the CabFabLab need some maintenance, cleaning and oiling too, so we have decided to close the lab until Monday the 2nd of August. Please e-mail us if you want to place a reservation for August, the phone won’t be answered when we’re not at the lab.

Sculptor Alice Bakker came to the CabFabLab to explore her craft through the digital domain.  Usually working with hammered and forged sculptures in steel and copper, Alice decided to give Blender, the open source 3D modeling software,  a whirl. Her skilled craft lent itself well to designing in a 3D environment, and she quickly came up with some beautiful results.

The files were exported from Blender and then printed on our Dimension SST 3D Printer. The model is about 8cm high. Make sure to check out Alice’s website to see more of her work.

Graphic designer Fabio Bartali had the idea to make a chocolate pilcrow (¶ = end of paragraph sign). With a few sketches, he came to the CabFabLab to figure out the best way to bring his project to life.

Our intern Sjors helped Fabio design a 3D model in SolidWorks. We then assisted Fabio in working with the CNC router to machine the positive mold for the silicone resin. This mold was used to create a negative silicone mold to produce the chocolate character.

Fabio sent the chocolate pilcrow to his clients as a holiday gift. This project was partly inspired by Hans Wisbrun’s ChocoPi project. And don’t forget to check out Fabio’s project log on his blog (in Dutch).

Fabio’s original sketch of the mold.

The rendered 3D model of the pilcrow mold in SolidWorks.

The finishing pass on the CNC router.

Pouring silicone into the master mold.

Liquid white chocolate solidifying inside the silicone molds.

The end product:  plenty of chocolate pilcrows in 3 different types of chocolate!

Check out our photostream for more photos of the Chocolate Pilcrow and the process. We would love to hear about your ideas and projects regarding food fabrication. Let us know if you need any help with your next project!

Many people have noticed that our previous VOIP line had some problems: bad audio quality, sudden interruptions and hang-ups during conversations. We tried all kinds of settings and fixes, but the problems seemed to get even worse. To fix this annoying problem we decided to switch back to a good old analog phone line, so please update your records!

From March 1st we can be reached at 070-3833188, our old phone number will be discontinued in a couple of months.

Dutch students Emile Pop and Justin de Boer, from The Hague University (Haagse Hogeschool), are in the final stages of building their dream: The Savage Rivale Roadyacht GTS, a 4 door “topless on demand” supercar.

The rear light fixtures were printed at the CabFabLab using the Dimension SST1200ES 3D printer. The Savage Rivale Roadyacht GTS will be manufactured in a limited run of 20 cars. The rear light fixtures for the production run will be 3D printed due to the high cost of injection molded parts for such a small run. The transparent vacuum formed light cover and bent plastic interior were made at The Hague University (HHS).

After having built a “proof of concept” model of the rear light unit, Emile and Justin came back to the FabLab to print an improved version, for both the left and right side of the car. Adding up to a total of 6 3D jobs that took 75 hours. Luckily the Dutch supplier of the ABS plastic, SomaTech, was willing to help them out a bit by offering the required material at cost.

A part of the rear light unit — fresh out of the printer.

The light unit assembled along with the light cover.

The Savage Rivale Roadyacht GTS

Check out our photostream for more photos of The Savage Rivale Roadyacht GTS and the development process.

We put together a photo set containing a selection of CabFabLab’s most interesting projects and events of 2009.

We hope that this selection will shed some light on the wide variety of projects that can be realized with the help of a FabLab. Take some time to get inspired and come visit us for your next project!

Last week we went shopping for some chemicals that were needed for our flame polisher. None of our local suppliers had MEK (Methyl Ethyl Ketone) in stock, so we settled on using acetone instead. Acetone is also part of the chemical ketone solvent famliy and produces similar results.

We had to fill the machine with a distilled water and hydroxide solution, which is used in an electrolytic process to produce combustible oxygen and hydrogen gas. This gas is fed through a second tank where the acetone will evaporate and add to the mixture. This gas mixture will flow through the small nozzle of the hand gun when the knob is turned and can simply be lit with a lighter. The machine is very easy to use and it requires about 30 seconds before it’s ready for use.

The flame polisher can be used to smooth the edges of CNC machined acrylic sheet with a small and very hot flame.  This process is very quick and clean when compared to manually sanding and polishing the edges. Another advantage is that you can easily polish pockets and those hard-to-reach spots of very detailed objects.

Below is an example of the result that can be achieved with this small machine. We used some scrap CNC machined acrylic sheet to test and practice flame polishing. The left part hasn’t been treated yet and the right part got a quick polishing treatment, you can clearly see the difference! Check out more pictures and a movie of the machine in action at our Flickr PhotoStream: Flame polisher set.

Last summer, the CabFabLab was visited by radio journalist Rob Buiter for the “Hoe? Zo!” Teleac radio show. You can find a short introduction and MP3 recording of the interview on the Teleac Hoe? Zo! website.

The nice folks of design studio “Trapped in Suburbia” were asked to redesign the torture basement exhibition of museum goudA on a budget. The adhesive vinyl masks for the UV reactive paint and flashlight key chains were all cut at the CabFabLab. The results are stupendous! This is a great example of how the FabLab can be used for financially constrained projects. Time, effort, a little love and access to a FabLab can easily match the results of a big budget production.

Description from Trapped in Suburbia’s Behance page:

“For museum goudA, we were asked to redesign the torture exhibition in their cellar. And so we started to think how to make it more exciting and get kids to read the little signs next to the torture equipment. We decided to make it an experience and put all the information on the floor with UV-paint. One can only see the illustrations and explanations when shining the UV-flashlight over certain areas, otherwise it is simply white. This interactivity forces you to go exploring and discover new things. All the info on the floor is hand drawn, even the text. Illustration was done by Jos Verwer, the typography by Trapped in Suburbia. Special thanks to the CabFabLab, for their support.”

For more information have a look at Trapped in Suburbia’s portfolio page.

Due to the holiday season the CabFabLab will be closed for public until the 4th of January 2010. As many of you know the lab is still run by a small group of volunteers. We desperately need some time to focus on the future of the CabFabLab, so we can finish our business plan & funding request for upcoming years. Additionally some of our hi-tech work spots and machines need to be cleaned, oiled and serviced so they can serve all our visitors well in 2010.

We’d like to thank all people who visited the CabFabLab in 2009, we’ve seen so many nice and innovative projects, we met a lot of interesting people and we had a great year at our new location! We can’t wait to see what next year will be like at the CabFabLab!

Have a nice Christmas and a fabtastic new year!