MacAnus

Pretty sure these are eggs... But what creatures will emerge?

Finger for scale

Outside a local school window.
I'm guessing it has to do with networking but I'm curious about why they're outside, especially as they're not that high off the ground and can easily be tampered with from the street.
Stickers on them read "ROCK" and "ROLL".

For packing joints.

I made a little baseball bat years ago for that purpose and recently had fun making more different ones for friends.

As you can see I used a piece of rebar for the bat.
I "turned" it using a drill and angle grinder then going through different grains of sanding:

The lightsaber's hilt was made the same way, using a dremel tool to get more control on the details.
The "blade" is made of Corian, a synthetic stone commonly used for countertops.

The sword required a lot more precision to make and ended up okay but looking closely nothing is really symmetrical or straight...
I grinded it from a random stick of metal, the pommel is made from aluminum and the grip is two layers of sewing thread soaked in superglue, sanded, then superglued again.
A cross-guard would have added a lot of character but I didn't find a nice and easy enough way to do it, and I was short on time...

Today I jumped back on this project that has been on pause for about a year :)
Turning cheap defective desktop speakers into a set of wireless Bluetooth stereo speakers.
Got the idea from this video from DiyPerks.

I'm trying to recycle as much as I can:
Desktop speakers were defective and given to me by family,
Bluetooth receivers are from old earbuds,
Batteries come from and old powerbank,
Charging module from old vapes (still need to figure out a few things about them, not sure I'll end up using those).
The only thing I bought so far are amps for the audio output tu the speakers.

Any input or advice is welcome :)

I'll keep you updated with more details if anyone is interested

Recently dismantled a TV and its backlighting consisted of thin cfl tubes. This gave me the material to try something I've been curious about for a while! I sealed some yeast in a little section of tubing for a friend's birthday (his last name is Baker). Kind of a shitty gift as i doubt it would survive as a keychain but I had fun making it (and its failed predecessors). Here are the other attempts, from left to right: pepper, red and blue food coloring, yeast

Plug one side of the cable on the left of the box, the other side on the right, press the button and whichever light doesn't come on means that part of the cable is faulty. I learned a lot from my bad decisions :)

I made this a few years ago and still use it regularly! The "spoon" side fills up with 1 portion of rice and the hole in the handle can fit 1 portion of spaghetti. What do you think?

Edit: sorry about the double post.. I thought I had backed out and lost the first one so I posted this one, and I just noticed the first one went up

Made this out of a plastic bottle after seeing a YouTube video (can't give credit unfortunately as I can't find it anymore).

You can make it into any shape that the bottle will fit around (and can't be much smaller than the bottle since it will only shrink so much).

I used a piece of wood as template, cut the top of the bottle, put it around the piece of wood and shrank it with a heat gun. I then cut off the excess and shaped the closing mechanism.

It took a few tries to get it right but I've since used the technique to make containers/protections for several objects and I'm very happy with the results!

If you want to try this, be aware that the tightest you shrink the bottle around the template, the hardest it will be getting it out! I suggest making the template in atleast 2 pieces, this helped me a lot. (In this example I first pulled out the small wooden tab with pliers, and once out the bigger one came out easily).

Hi all,

Do you have some recommendations for a soldering station that would meet my needs?

I've been into hobby electronics for a few years, doing mostly analog audio projects but recently got into repairing and repurposing broken electronics (Bluetooth earbuds, speakers, USB cables and such).

I've been using a cheap Parkside(LIDL)-rebranded "generic Chinese product" (I came across the exact same model on AliExpress, in different colors); which has served me well until now but has a few flaws that I can't be bothered with anymore. Mainly: -it takes ages to get hot. -the cable going from the station to the iron is super thick and stiff, which is annoying as hell...

I would like it to be the least expensive possible, while being good enough I'd be happy with it for the foreseeable future.

I have been looking at these:

Old tech, cheap tips (<1€)

Newer tech, "expensive" tips (8-10€)

And wondering how these "newer" types of iron compare to stations, what are the main drawbacks?

Thanks a lot in advance for any input, Please be gentle if you think I'm an idiot :)

Edit: changed the "Smolderin" in title to "soldering"