Tuning the newly assembled Series 1 3D printer, from Type A Machines.

As of late Tuesday night, HackLab is now the proud owner of a Series 1 3D printer, by Type A Machines. Leading to 5 members to tackle the construction, calibrations, initial tuning and testing of the printer. I expect throughout the following week the printer will be fine tuned and will settle in amongst the other printers we have in the lab.  I am sure we will be printing some add-ons for the Series 1 soon as well once the tuning is done, such as a tool rest and holder. We may even be adding LED lights to it to better see how the print job is adhering to the surface and see when problems are occurring in during the print job.                                                              I care to thank Type A Machines for the donation of the new printer, and care to extend an invitation to please stop by the lab during our Open House to see what we are creating with this amazing printer.

3D printers settling in to their new place in the lab.

At the rate we are building, working with, and utilizing 3D printers we may have to designate part of HackLab the Print Lab. I hope soon we can add the second Ultimaker we have been slowly repairing to our library of tools allowing more members to print at the same time and gain experience working with these tools. Thank you again Type A Machines for aiding to our creative, and educational tool library.

For 11 more photos from the build. and a photo of the first item printed please click upon the (continue reading) text below for more.

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Hacklab had a booth at the Waterloo Mini Maker Faire, ironically held at Kitchener City Hall. We talked to hundreds of people about our tech community here in Kensington Market, and gave away a lot of stickers, buttons, and inspiration. Check out my flickr gallery of the faire, or read the posts I made at Toronto Maker Faire blog and my personal blog digitalcrusader.ca.

What does this room of people all have in common?

Arts and crafts being setup.

Several weeks ago now the Toronto Mini Maker Faire Launch party happened.

You can find more images on the following photo streams; Photo booth shots and more,  Photos by Adam Evenden

Upon entering the launch party and registering attendees where faced with an arts and crafts table, full of hot glue, blank masks, LED’s, Coin battery’s, pipe cleaners, markers,  tape, Glitter, and more.
Click more to see some of the creations.

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Lathe in action

Click more to see more pictures of the lathe in action, and the first mystery project

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Laser cutter fun.

During one snowy Hacklab open house there was some creative

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Book Scanning Machine

Over the past couple of months, Hacklab has been having conversations with the Toronto Public Library, especially people at the Toronto Reference Library and the Digital Design Studio. A lot of us LOVE the TPL, it’s one of the largest public library systems in North America, and I personally get a lot of use from it – probably a new book every 2 weeks or so, through their hold system, which wonderfully moves the book from whichever of the 98 branches it’s current at to your branch :-).

A few weeks ago, about a dozen employees of the library visited hacklab for a tour of our space. You can read their wonderful hacklab blog post where they talk about the visit. They peppered us with questions about our 3D printer, the workshops that we run, the philosophy and operation of the space, etc. A good time was had by all!

Sherlock Holmes Chess Set

More recently, they invited us to tour the Toronto Reference Library, one of the largest branches of the Toronto Public Library. You can see a few of the shots I took here: Toronto Reference Library Flickr Set. Sadly of course I don’t have any photos of the awesome view from the transparent elevators! We got to see a lot of the behind-the-scenes places in the library, including the printing room, the preservation and digitization area, and an archival area. We also saw some of their computer classroom areas, the really nifty TD Gallery, currently showing a Sherlock Holmes exhibit (including very cool Sherlock Holmes chess set!), and the all-glass study pods.

They are interested in having some kind of “makerspace” area in at least one of the branches, and so they are touring lots of related things in and around Toronto. Hacklab was pleased to help them out, and if you think this is something the Toronto Public Library should do, I’m sure they’d love to hear your support!