To hack something is to take something apart and change the way it works. Anything can be hacked from appliances, toys, clothing, furniture, vehicles, robots, and whatever else you can get your hands on. It’s a exploration in the way things work, and seeing what interesting ways they can be modified.
At our weekly Open Hack Nights, we invite everyone to come and tinker with us! Whether you repurpose fabric and furniture or tinker with toys and electronics, all are welcome to these events. We have a lot of interesting things to take apart in our Electronics Lab’s scrap bins, plus plenty of workspace for those that just need room to tinker and want to be around others. We only open our Electronics Lab and Classroom for guests at this event, the rest of our shop is off limits for non-members.
Every Friday at 6pm, join other makers, explore the way things work, and make them do something interesting!
Update July 9th: Thank you to all who have donated equipment so far! We have received donated equipment from various members of the community in the seacoast area and are almost at our goal. We still are seeking replacements for our large table saw and our compound miter saw, but we have gotten everything else for our wood shop. If you know of anyone that is upgrading their equipment or is moving and has to get rid of their equipment please send them our way!
The Makerspace’s wood shop is in need of some new equipment. During the early years of the space there were some generous members that loaned us most of what we use today for a set period of time. We are approaching the time at which we need to give these tools back to their original owners, so we are now seeking donations from the community to help us replace this equipment.
Our current finances aren’t good enough to be able to cover the $10,000 it would take to replace all of the tools, but we know there are tools out there that people aren’t using or want to get rid of that would do just fine for us. Primary tools we are looking for right now are a table saw, band saw, miter saw, and jointer. Any other wood shop equipment would be welcome as well, but those are the main tools we cannot do without.
It’s at this point we’d like to remind people that we are a registered non-profit and can write receipts for any donated equipment, as well as monetary donations (which are also welcome). If you or someone you know has equipment that is in good condition and are willing to part with it please contact us at shop@portcitymakerspace.com or 603-988-5798. We also have a equipment donation proposal form that you can fill out here, which provides us with details for review so we can determine if it will work for the wood shop.
If you can make a monetary donation towards this effort you can do so one our donate page. We will provide you with a receipt of donation.
Upcoming Classes Glass Bottle Cutting Workshop December 17th @ 2:00 PM – 5:00 PM Intro Welding December 18 @ 1:00 PM – 4:00 PM Intro Soldering December 22 @ 6:00 PM – 8:30 PM Intro to CNC Routers January 19, 2017 @ 5:30 PM – 8:30 PM Intro Soldering January 26, 2017 @ 6:00 PM – 8:30 PM Free Open Hack Nights! Every Friday Night 6pm-8pm
Bring a project and work on it in our Electronics Lab or Classroom Space. Share, meet, and collaborate with other makers.
(Note: Next year we will be calling these “Open Create Night” to avoid confusion. Originally named after Life Hacking and the focus on clever ways to make/repurpose stuff.)
Holiday Closure
The makerspace will be closed to non-members between December Sunday 25th 2016 and January 2nd 2017. If you need to contact us you can send an email to shop@portcitymakerspace.com, but our phones will not be answered during that time. Thanks!
Five non-profits, including our makerspace, were selected by the Fabulous Find this month of donations! For those that aren’t familiar with it, the Fabulous Find is a thrift store that dedicates its sales to supporting other non-profits related to the arts, environment, food pantry, fuel assistance, animal shelter and educational organizations.
The non-profits they select each month receive a portion of the sales generated during that month. A couple of us from the makerspace attended the kickoff meeting for this month and got to witness previous organizations receive checks of $7800 each!Help us this month by making your thrift store purchases at their shop!
Back by popular demand! Attendees learn to make simple soldered circuits at the Dover Public Library. Participants will use a hot soldering iron to melt solder and then fuse LED lights to a robot badge ornament for the tree or a light up 3D Christmas tree!
This workshop is already full up, but stay tuned on the library’s page and newsletter for more in the future!
Alex and Jeff will be doing a 3D Printing demo at Bad Lab Brewery in Somersworth! They will be talking all about how the custom-built 3D printer works, how they made it, and how easy it is to make a 3D print! Free to attend! Suggested donation of $8. Ages 21 and up.
One of our members has been doing regular DIY demonstration videos of several projects. You can see larger videos on his youtube channel, and lots of quick ones on his instagram at @residentmaker
Thanks to a generous donor we now have a nice big potter’s wheel, currently residing in our garage by the Bike Bench. This pairs greatly with our kiln, which we’ve had for about a year now. With these two combined you can now start making pots, mugs, jars, and more at the makerspace!
For those interested in learning we will soon have a class on working with clay and doing firings in our kiln. The potter’s wheel may require a one-on-one class, and will have to be scheduled by interest. If there’s a class you’d like to hear about when its scheduled, see our Class Waiting List page and fill out the form there.
New to this lineup is our Intro to Photoshop class, taught by Matthew Doherty. Matt works out of the Button Factory and has done a lot of digital editing work professionally. He has also done some impressive projects here such as a mobile changing room for surfing and refinishing a large canoe with fiberglass resin.
Our CNC Routers get a fair amount of use these days, and what people make with them can be pretty amazing! Below is a gallery of some CNC projects from members and our resident CNC expert Alex. He also does monthly classes on how to use our CNC machines (next one is March 17th) so you can get started on the path to making cool stuff like this!
This is a pin from the show Game of Thrones. The 3D file can be found on CG Trader here.
The members of Lost Woods Turning Co. have been making guitar picks out of various specialty woods. They do a lot of great stuff, so you should check their website out here.
It’s like there’s a bunch of nerds here. This is a Hylian Crest carved into a piece of Lignum Vitae, or “ironwood”.
This shiny piece of metal is a branding iron in progress! It’s got someone’s signature on it so they can sign their woodworking with a hot metal version of it.
Some signs need to be made. Truer word were never carved.
