I was cleaning out my car and found a small toy plastic spider. I suddenly realized that if I were to hit it with a heat-gun, I could bend the legs into any pose I wanted. So I printed out a tree stump from Thingiverse # 3033820 scaled appropriately to be a stand, and bent the spider legs so that it would stand on the stump. After that, I just had to paint it….
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I’ve been very happy with this 28mm Cobra model from Thingiverse. Even printed on my low end FDM printer it retains enough texture so that dry brushing works well to accent the scales. I used a heat gun to rotate the left model’s head 90 degrees in relation to it’s body, and the center model’s tail into a loop so that the three figures look slightly different, but mostly the color choices are the defining differences.
I 3D printed and painted this Slurk from ClayRade’s Thingiverse # 4417796. The print worked well even on my low end FDM printer (I used the version with “Drool” to act as support for the fangs, but cut the connection to leave the fangs free standing).
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These treasure chests and barrels are from Dutch Mogul’s Loot Markers pack, Thingiverse number 2010492.
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I purchased an old (1977 manufacture date) AMF Alcort Sunfish 14 foot sailing dinghy. It was mostly complete and almost “ready-to-sail”, except for the broken auto-bailer, and cracked rudder, but the price was right.
Since I had to repair the crack in the rudder, I decided to go overboard and completely restore the entire rudder and tiller assembly. And once the rudder looked nice, I had left-over varnish and decided to go ahead and re-surface the daggerboard as well.
I also added a ratcheting mainsheet block, replaced all of the lines and purchased some necessary accessories (deck cover, beach dolly).
After the first sail I drained all of the water out of the hull (which MIGHT have already been in there…..maybe….) and purchased a better drain plug and rigged up a solar powered fan to dry things out. If I find water inside after the second sail, I’ll probably be doing some fiberglass hull repair.
You can see all of the details by watching the (multiple!) videos in this YouTube playlist:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLmHP4lUqxKmv13lkNpPqG2FbnV9L4aaL0
I’ve found that the Better Boat Mini-Paddle fits perfectly into the rear cubbyhole on my 1977 boat.
I bought an EcoQube C+ (3 gallon aquarium/aquaponics system with a built in spot for a few small plants) from a discount deal of the day website (after their Kickstarter imploded…and somebody offloaded the product). The model I got was the EcoQube C+ UV, which has a small box containing UV LEDS just after the pump, that supposedly keep algae and other bad stuff from growing in the water.
Of course, it didn’t come with the plant growth medium that you are supposed to use in the four little baskets, so I bought some coco hanging basket liner and used a small strip of that in a loop to hold some perlite in the basket to support the roots of some sweet mint.
I noticed that the water was evaporating relatively quickly, possibly due to the large opening at the top. You used to be able to buy a glass cover for the 2 gallon EcoQube C, but it was out of stock, and probably wouldn’t fit the C+ anyways, so I decided to make my own out of 1/8″ clear acrylic.
This view with the protective paper still on the acrylic lets you see how it fits over the tank, and the following photo shows what it looks like when the protective paper is removed.
If you have access to a laser cutter, you can download my .SVG file to make your own: ecoCubeC+cover.svg
Or find it on Thingiverse: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:4924825
Back in 2015 I bought a wrecked 2013 Nissan leaf and salvaged it’s 48 battery modules to use in my s-10 electric pickup truck. At the time, the batteries had 18,921 miles from the Leaf on them, (10 quick charges and 775 Level 1/ Level 2 charges) and the leaf BMS reported a capacity of 64 amp hours (98% state of health). [The modules are rated at a minimum of 60 AH new, but most exceed the minimum specifications a bit.]
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iCharger 306B used for balance charging, and capacity test discharging my Nissan Leaf Modules.
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I installed a CURT 11396 Class 1 Trailer Hitch receiver onto our 2015 Nissan Leaf. The procedure was relatively straightforward, but took me around three hours (the instructions say the novice install time is 70 minutes). If you don’t already have a jack and set of jackstands, I’d recommend buying a set of auto ramps for this procedure, as it doesn’t involve the wheels/tires.
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When we bought a used Kia Optima PHEV (off lease) it was missing the Maps SD card that plugs into the infotainment unit, so the onboard maps & navigation did not work. Given that every phone now comes with multiple GPS navigation & mapping options, this wasn’t a deal-breaker, but I was worried that this would be a very expensive dealer only purchase if we ever wanted to get it working.
I was very pleasantly surprised to find out that Kia will sell and ship you an SD card with updated map data and infotainment software for only $25!
The magic website is easy to find: https://update.kia.com/
I was even happier to find out that if I didn’t want to pay the $25 and wait for shipping, I could buy my own 32 GB Class 10 SDHC UHS-1 card (For $10), download their (Windows or Mac only) software and use it to write the data out to the card myself at home!