Toombstone Labs

I have recently been building a workbench for all of my projects so that I can move away from using my desk for soldering and cutting stuff. I was starting to really mess up the surface. It's a pretty simple bench put together with 2x3's (2x6's ripped in half), some plywood, and particle board for the top surface. It is held together with bolts mostly to make it easy to take apart for semi-portability. I still need to make a battery charging station and put up an overhead florescent light and some outlets. Update 9/27/2017: I was able to get some some outlets installed to plug in my battery charger as well my soldering iron and hot glue gun. I also put in a super bright LED light overhead. It really brights up the bench at night.

I designed a case for the electronics circuit board tonight. It will be laser cut out of 1/8" plywood and then glued together. The ports are for (left to right): 3s battery, TX signal to Dragonlink by servo cable, video RX to the 5.8 GHz repeater by servo cable, window for digital voltage indicator, and antenna for the 5.8 GHz repeater. The case will then be secured by screws into the back of the biquad antenna so everything but the Dragonlink module can be removed from the tripod in one piece. I will update this post with pictures of the final product but it may be awhile because I still need to order the digital voltage indicator.

Today, I got around to designing support structure for the biquad antenna. I also cut some PEX tubing to make quick connect flexible clamps to hold the antenna to the tripod. This will allow for quick assembly of the ground station and will make it fast to pack up. I countersunk the holes so the flat head screws didn't stick out and touch the tripod legs when snapped on. Also, I needed to file down the points on the other side so they wouldn't stick through to the reflector plate.

Since I live in Illinois it is hard to get out to fly in the winter due to the dreadful weather. So I decided to use my time indoors building a ground station so that when the weather becomes more bearable I will be ready for some fun flights. Setup will look something like this I have about a five foot tall tripod that I will use as the base for all of my equipment. To start I drew out a general schematic of how I wanted to set it up. Dragonlink V2 for control on the top of the extendable head, 1.3 GHz biquad antenna for video on the top of the legs, and an electronics box somewhere in the middle. This will have a 2.4 GHz FrSky D4RII receiver to use as the link from my transmitter to the Dragonlink. Also, I will run the video out from the receiver through a DVR and then into the 5.8 GHz transmitter to repeat the signal to either my goggles or monitor. To reduce the wiring I decided to build an electronics box. This will hold all of the components mentioned and using ...

My 3D printing days began in 2013. Like many others in the RepRap community I started out with a RepStrap (term coined by the community) because I built it with parts that I salvaged from other things. I started by finding old inkjet printers for on Craigslist for very cheap or even free. I took as many as I could get and took them all apart searching for smooth hardened steel rods, brass bushings for linear motion, and stepper motors for driving the axes. After finding enough parts, I built a typical moving bed frame out of 8020 1" t-slot profile. It was a decent printer but was very limited by speed and since it was all cobbled together from wood parts it wasn't the most accurate. Wanting better, I started designing my own CoreXY printer because I liked the idea of the print bed not moving in the X and Y axes. I designed it to be mostly printable and lasercut-able. I re-purposed some of the frame pieces from my old printer in this design. After putting it all together,...

The 1680mm size Skywalker is a great plane and I have read lots of good things about its little brother. So I decided to try my hand at building a Mini Skywalker. Scaled to about 95% First, I found some good pictures for getting the dimensions and general design. Then, I used the pictures with a few known dimensions to find the rest of them and I drew out the most important parts. I used 6mm Depron with for most of it and some 1" EPS to thicken the nose for space to put my battery and other components. For the wing, I did a fold over style Armin-type airfoil with packing tape on one side. This was my first wing built this way so it didn't turn out great but I think it will do the job. I put a small carbon spar at about 1/3 of the chord. HXT500 5 gram servo installation Fuselage wall Both walls with 1" EPS block to thicken the front Approximate layout I am using an old mini quad motor, 2204 2300kv, with a 5045 prop, FrSky D4RII...