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About brian

I am really smart.

The 3rd annual Sumobot signup sheet is out. You can fill it out online:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/viewform?fromEmail=true&formkey=dEg1a01ER2ZFVE9memYtX3h1U2xLVlE6MA

You can read about the Sumobot competition here http://wiki.lvl1.org/Sumobots

There are loads of links and information about sumobots on that page. IT IS NOT TOO LATE TO MAKE A BOT!

Also there is a costume party that night so be sure to dress up!

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ANNOUNCING - LVL1's 3rd annual Sumobot tournament will be on Saturday October 27th, 2012, 8PM at 814e Broadway (our home). There will be a Halloween party following the fun. All are welcome to join in the festivities. You have 6 weeks to build your bot. There will be prizes and eternal glory!

The rules and loads of information about how to make your own bot are on our wiki page http://wiki.lvl1.org/Sumobots

Sumobots are a good project if you are looking to prove your engineering powers.  There are also several kits on the Internet that are fun to build!

Print a poster and post it at your favorite coffee shop: Sumo 2012 Poster

Last night I made LVL1's hackerspace passport using our Full Spectrum Engineering laser. It really was not that difficult. I used Chris Cprek's LVL1 logo image for the stamp. It is the Plenary Gear logo at the top left of this page.

I used laserable rubber for this project. Even though it is low-odor you can still smell it. It smells like burning rubber from a car.

To laser the image, I took the original image and made it black and white. I removed the blue background and cleaned it up a bit using Gimp. I then imported it into Inkscape where I mirrored the image. The letters have to be in mirror image or it will not stamp correctly. Next, I 'printed' to the laser cutter. The Full Spectrum Engineering interface to driving the laser is pretty darned good. If you are reading this post and do not have a laser, check out Full Spectrum, they are a real good value for your money and highly recommended.

For the laser settings, I raster printed the image using 50% speed and 100% power. I tried to cut the rubber around the image, but the rubber does not cut well at all. I tried multiple passes and everything. I ended up using an exact knife.

I also cut a wooden back for the rubber out of some 1/8" baltic birch plywood scrap I had laying around. I used double stick tape to tape the rubber onto the plywood backing. Easy. Finally I hot melt glued a handle onto the stamp. Interestingly, the handle came from the Louisville Slugger Museum and it is a scrap from when a baseball bat is cut out on their lathe.

I used a stamp pad from office depot which worked well and Jon was able to stamp his passport for the first time! I also made another stamp with the Lady Ada graphic from Adafruit. That also came out well.

Today, as I wrote the post, I saw that Becky Stern from AdaFruit posted an excellent 'how to' on stamp making... http://www.adafruit.com/blog/2012/04/03/how-to-laser-cut-your-own-hackerspace-stamp/. It is funny how sometimes you discover someone is doing the exact same thing as you! AdaFruit sells Hackerspace passports if you need one.

Hack on!
Brian