Zach Fredin

this seems like a perfect blizzard activity

a flush is meant to signal an end. A passage. A discarding of remnants left useless to the body and the being from whence they came.

and yet.

and yet it is a beginning.

a flush marks the first steps of a journey towards renewal.

i say flush not to forget.

rather flush to forge ahead, anew.

Icebreaker!!!

An exciting machine is now commissioned! 😬😬😬

the birds are so round and poofed today!

Oooh plz share your experiences. I've been thinking about setting up some mesh(tastic/core) things at some point.

junco on beam

purple bird sticker on hard hat

work bird updates

your code will run backwards!!!!!

MORE SHIFT REGISTERS

MOOOOORE

Found an old project in a box and it still works! The wires got a bit crumpled but all sixteen LEDs still glow.

important 3d prints today

I used Fusion360 for design work; generally, I make the finished thing, then make a plaster block and Boolean subtract the thing, then make a silicone block and Boolean subtract the plaster, then make a PLA block and Boolean subtract the silicone, then export and print.

Sure! I 3D printed a primary mold for each half, then cast silicone (Mold Star 30) into that, vibratory de bubbled, then cast 50:50 pottery plaster and hydrocal into the silicone. The tiles have a 5 degree draft, but soft tooling means this isn't critical.

It's similar to slip casting but uses a closed 2-part mold with vents, so excess material zoops out and you get good thickness control. I mix the material to a trowel-able consistency, somewhat peanut butter like. Or perhaps a good buttercream frosting.

this weekend was a Sludge Tile Production Weekend

should have clarified this post is specifically here to troll @todbot.com

new work mac feat. diverse LED chemistries for various green indicators (shout-out zachfred.in/projects/bli... for avoiding clashes!)

I know! It is quite interesting. We figured out that the sludge alone is too, so it's not something that appears as a result of our process. Was a real surprise.

move slow and fix stuff poster

if you're feeling generous a donation of 10$ or more to OSHWA will get you one of these beautiful Move Slow and Fix Stuff riso printed posters designed by @leeborg.bsky.social ! Donate here:

secure.lglforms.com/form_engine/...

Oh! Sorry I will contextualize more. Merlin, in addition to being a stubby bird of prey, is also a wonderful app by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology ("Merlin Bird ID") that helps one ID birds by description, image, or recorded sound. It is a brilliant and free educational tool, highly recommended!

Merlin doesn't yet have giant yellow glowing bird statues in its database!!! Ugh

merlin fails to identify a giant glowing yellow bird

:_(

A friend snuck into the workshop 🥹

yes! Mostly aluminum in the case of this machine. And clay slop, at generally 50:50 by weight. It's been quite a rabbit hole.

waterjet sludge composite experiments continue, basement-kiln-edition!!

Maybe typical aspect ratio?? I dunno. Seems pretty chonky. Lots of berries.

Low aspect ratio groundhog eating kousa dogwood berries

thermal hummingbirdo

oooooooooh flexure printers 🥰 I knew I should have gone to fab25!