My father and I recently decided that we wanted a router table. Rather than buying a full unit which would be expensive and take up precious shop space, we decided to build an insert that would mount to a table saw. I won't go into the details of the table build (perhaps in another post), but want to share the vacuum mount I made for the table. In order to accommodate the router, an extension had to be made for the table saw fence (the bit needs to be able to go into a slot in the fence). My father...

A few years ago I bought some macro extension tubes so that I could experiment with macro photography. Unfortunately, the tubes didn't work very well; the lens wouldn't lock into the tubes, so using them was very risky. I put them aside and moved on; they were only $6 anyway. Fast forward a year and we have built a 3D printer: time to fix these extension tubes! The Problem Looking inside the tubes I could see that the lever that holds the lens in place was too thin. It could easily slip past the slot in the lens, preventing it...

3D printers may seem like a piece of specialty equipment, but they have a lot of practical uses. We use ours all the time and don't know what we'd do without one! Recently my father was installing sliding doors in a gazebo. The doors hang off of a set of rollers in a track. This means that the top of the door is held in place, but the bottom can swing in and out. This could be a problem in a wind storm, so some kind of guide is needed... Off to the 3D printer! To accomplish the task, we...

These days 3D printing is all the rage: cars are being printed, inexpensive prosthetics are being produced, complex surgeries are being completed with the help of 3D printing, and so much more. Companies are producing low cost consumer printers, RepRap printers are becoming fairly easy to build, and in general it isn't to difficult to get your hands on a 3D printer. However, the average person is probably still wondering, “What would I actually use a 3D printer for?” This series will show everyday uses for 3D printers. Many of these projects will seem small and insignificant, but that’s...