Schematics for Displaying your Lego Creation

Properly displaying one's Lego creations is an incredibly important aspect of any true Lego fan's efforts.  To that end I have sketched out a stand system that can be made using 1/8 inch acrylic, a laser cutter or CNC machine, and a decently high resolution 3-D printer, or if you are willing to destroy some bricks you can skip the laser cutter3-D printer.

 The image below is a full render of what the base should roughly look like. 

The grid pattern you see at the base of the display stand is to allow for the user to position the supports as needed.  The grid pattern repeats every 8 mm, which is the standard spacing for the studs on Lego bricks.  

The curved pieces have two lower contacts to help keep them in place.  The top element is intended to mesh with the custom printed Lego Brick, that being said, someone could cut off that top contact point from the design and directly glue on a pre-existing brick.  For the cost conscious this would be the wiser choice, seeing as the cost of 3-D printing at Lego brick resolutions runs you something like $5/ brick.  

I would like to thank the author of robertcailiau.eu for their page on Lego Brick dimensions, the explanations on tolerancing rationals used by Lego corps was very helpful, and much faster to read than going through patents.

I will try to put up some engineering files later today.  Please note that I will not have curf corrections in the drawings as I cannot account for machining variances.

Seeing the Seas

Paddleboarding is a fun way to explore the shores of your favorite vacation spot or your home waters, unfortunately traditional stand up paddleboards block their riders ability to see underneath.  A smarter paddleboard design would integrate a viewing window into as much of the body of the board as possible as well as integrated illumination systems designed to allow for night time viewing.  The render below (to be added later) shows a conceptual design that is intended to ensure that the viewing segments minimize the possibility of scratches and scrapes that might interfere with the viewing experience.

It turns out that while writing this article I found a few existing proposals/patents for a paddleboard intended to have a transparent viewing bottom, but as far as my research has gone there is no consumer product currently available.

Links

Illuminated Paddleboard

http://www.floridasportsman.com/2013/12/19/night-ops-recon-underwater-lighting/

Patent for a Paddleboard with a viewing windo

http://www.google.com/patents/US4925417

Kickboard(s) with a viewing system
http://www.gizmag.com/snorkelboard-snorkeling-flutter-board/30885/
http://www.gizmag.com/zayak-sea-sled-underwater/29740/

Knock off Nerf Idea

Fig 1 Nerf N-Strike Elite Rayven
Source:Hasbro corporate page

One of the minor frustrations of many traditional nerf gun designs is the potential for darts jamming.  While newer designs have added special access ports for clearing darts that have folded in on each other I felt it would be cool to put forth my own concept for a dart gun that eliminates the potential for jams and allows for easier reloading to boot.  Instead of utilizing the more common spring clip design used in toys like the Nerf Rayven (figure 1) this design would have each round placed in their own specialized chamber (fig 2)

(I will try to add some more details but right now I need to just get this out the door before I get back to job applications)

One of my favorite ideas in this design is the small magnets embedded in the pink side wall of the clip.  They serve as  way for whoever is using the toy to expand their clip as they are still firing their first clip.  During normal operation the magnets will keep the clips attached with enough force that normal jostling won't allow them to come apart and as each round is fired the next cell in the clip is chambered with the firing mechanism.  As the clip is pulled through and about to expire, a small amount of pressure is applied to the pink arms, forcing the magnets far enough apart that they upper clip can simply fall off.  On the right hand side of Figure 2 you will see the turquoise linear gear teetj that would allow for a worm gear to power the clips through the gun.

Figure 2

So while I like where I am going with this idea, I am going to call this a very basic early draft as there are about 20 things I would like to rethink/redesign for a system that would probably make a lot more sense