I made these frequently as a young boy, they are easy to make, parts are very cheap (if not free) and you can spend hours tweaking it!

What you need :

• About 1M (3′) Thin gauge enamel copper wire – thick enough that about three inches could support the weight of a pencil.
• Small magnet – many fridge magnets will do.
• 1xAA Battery (1.5v)
• Push pins or small finishing nails.
• Small square block of softwood (about 12 cm wide will do).
• 3cm (1.5″) diameter cylindrical object (large magic marker or C cell battery is about the right diameter.)

The Build :

Begin wrapping the copper wire around the cylindrical object 10 to 20 times leaving about 10cm (3-4″) free on each end- this will be used for the armature.  Wrap the wire a few times within the coil itself to keep the arms in place – you want to make sure they are exactly 180 degrees from each other and centered as they will be supporting the weight of the coil.  Strip the enamel off the arms  using some scissors or something sharp – they need to be totally free of enamel.

Cut two additional 10cm long pieces of wire and strip the enamel off completely – these will be the brushes and will support the armature / coil.  Now wrap each one a few times around each push pin and insert into the softwood block.  Create a small loop at the top of each brush for the armature to slide into.  Consult the (shaky) video if my writing doesn’t make any sense.

Attach the battery to each push pin with wires – it is really handy if you can find a battery chassis with the wires already attached.

I will take some steadier photos and maybe draw up a diagram if anyone wants further instruction.  All of the parts above I found at my favourite store Active Surplus for less than three dollars.  Enjoy your super fun DIY motors and feel free to submit your masterpieces – I will post them in a new article.

Nerd party this Friday (January 8th 2010) at the Green Room, I will definitely be attending with Y2P.  I guess they have wifi and decent drink prices so you should come early and horde the couches in the back (I plan to be there around 6PM).

Here’s a picture of the entrance so you’re not confused :

Hope to see you there!  See this article for more info.

I guess tonight while packing I had a few too many cups of coffee so I was obviously wired and decided to sit down and write some code.  I ended up writing an XMPP / Jabber relay for ENUMPlus which I must say works pretty damn good.  Setting this all up is a three step process ;

1. Create an account / Login to enumplus.org and click “Notifications”.  Input your XMPP user account in the form and press “Send Me Notifications!”.
2. Copy the provided dialplan addition and paste it into /etc/asterisk/extensions_custom.conf.  Reload your dial plan of course with asterisk -rx “dialplan reload”.
3. Add enumplus@gmail.com to your buddy list and test it out!

Here’s a screenshot to get started.

Anyway, go get signed up and test it out for yourself – it is a ton of fun!

Two CodeIgniter developers will be joining us for July’s Screencast – A spectacular C++ also PHP master Mr. Weston and of course myself.  This month’s topic will be JQuery and Codeigniter which I assume will draw a crowd as it is a quickly emerging now that CI has really exploded in popularity.

We have room for 18 participants and would love to know what the audience (meaning you) wants to discuss specifically.

Today (June 23rd) at 8:00 PM I will be hosting a 1 1/2 hour DimDim meeting for anyone interested in getting started with CodeIgniter.  I am by no means a CodeIgniter “guru” but  I love sharing knowledge and feel that this could be a beneficial webinar to attend.

Schedule:

Part I – Basic Principles and Standards

Part II – Open Q&A

Once again this is a Basic introduction so there are no stupid questions – looking forward to seeing you there!

I will be accepting 20 participants (first come – first serve).