I designed this Industrial Grade Human Powered Paper Rocket Launcher (aka "stomp rocket launcher") for the yearly Asheville Maker Faire and the Lake Eden Arts Festival and other big events where lots of people want to make and launch paper rockets.
In 2012 I volunteered with the TEDx Asheville event (www.tedxasheville.com). That year the theme was "The Edge". The conference explored all things relating to "the EDGE" and I decided this would be a great opportunity to explore near space ballooning. I volunteered at my kid's middle school where I worked with one of the science and math teachers and his students. Over the course of several weeks the students designed and built a "near space balloon" that carried a GO Pro video camera and two GPS devices along with small personal items from each student up to near space.
The balloon traveled 100,000 feet above sea level where the helium balloon popped (at 30 feet in diameter!). At that time the payload (an off-the-shelf foam cooler from the grocery store) parachuted back to earth in Boone, NC which is 100 miles from the launch site in Asheville, NC.
The above video was shown during the TEDx event to the audience and the students were on stage to answer questions.
During the design phase of this project my good friend Sharon Feingold suggested I get in touch with Jeff Kluger who authored the best selling book "Apollo 13" which was eventually made into a movie staring Tom Hanks. Jeff graciously Skyped with the students and did a little Q&A with us. See the photos below.
And then... Jeff Kluger decided to fly to Asheville from his office in New York City to visit the "near space balloon" students in person at the school. He gave a talk about his book "Apollo 13" and the science of space travel. See the photos of Jeff speaking below...
Here Jeff is signing the payload of the near space balloon project...
A few years ago I met Al Stahler in San Francisco at a Maker Faire like event. Al is the creative genius behind the "Fire Ball Gallery" (https://fireballgallery.com/). Al told me about one of his earlier projects called an "Airzooka Arcade" and the moment he described it I knew I had to make one myself.
The Airzooka is one of my favorite toys. It requires no batteries and is tons of fun. It shoots a vortex of air a long distance. The arcade has a supply of theater fog that the user can suck up into the Airzooka and once the elastic is released, the user can send a ring (donut) of smoke flying through the air toward the target (helium balloons).
I built my Airzooka Arcade for the 2017 Charlotte Mini Maker Faire. I exhibited with my friends from Asheville Makers. To my delight, the Airzooka Arcade was a huge hit with both kids and adults. Check out the video below.
In May 2014 I volunteered to design and lead a short Project Based Learning (PBL) experience for students at a school located in Asheville, North Carolina. Details about the project are HERE. That project was briefly featured on WLOS, a local ABC news affiliate TV station. That appearance resulted in my being invited to speak at TEDx Greenville. That speaking appearance resulted in Makey Makey inviting me to join their team as their first VP for Education Initiatives.
When I joined the Makey Makey team in November 2015 I was asked to design a one day Professional Development workshop for K12 educators and then establish "Training Partners" who would then deliver the workshop nationwide.
This work has allowed me to travel throughout the US (and sometimes beyond) to work with a wide variety of inspired educators who train K12 teachers. Details about this program are HERE at the Makey Makey website.
The Makey Makey team (a division of Joy Labz) is small and agile. Everyone on the team is smart and motivated. We're all driven to make a positive difference in the world.
Resources will be posted here
Books & Magazines
Websites
YouTube
CLICK HERE to download directions on how to build your very own "stomp" rocket launcher. I created this for my friends at Asheville Makers.
I built this giant vortex air cannon to “bring the boom” to Maker Faire Atlanta 2015.
I first built an air cannon out of a 32 gallon round plastic trash can. I followed one of the many tutorials on YouTube to figure out how to do this. It worked great but it just wasn’t big enough (the “boom” was lacking) so I went back to YouTube looking for giant vortex air cannons and I found the “Candle Cannon” (https://youtu.be/ayaiArVkpA4). The Candle Cannon is amazing but it’s expensive to build and requires a trailer to transport and a team to assemble. I wanted a giant vortex air cannon that was easy to transport (fit inside my car), easy to setup and breakdown, and inexpensive to build.
Fabric walls would be critical to the success of my design however I searched high and low and couldn’t find documented examples of vortex air cannons (small or large) with fabric walls. Did the community of vortex air cannon makers know something I didn’t? Knowing my finished product might not work, I moved forward with the build. In the end, I was rewarded with success: my air cannon shoots beautiful giant smoke rings long distances and I can easily store and transport the device. Boom!
MAKE Magazine asked me to write an article describing exactly how to make this air cannon. Find the article HERE.
My air cannon breaks down so I can easily transport it inside my car.
One of my favorite toys as a kid was a Krazy Kar. When my own kids were little they also enjoyed the Krazy Kar. Unfortunately, an adult sized Krazy Kar isn't sold so I decided to build my own (photo below). The frame is made of wood and the wheels are "garden cart" wheels that have bearings built in.
Here's my daughter racing around the nearby North Carolina Arboretum drop off area at the end of a "science fair" where we helped exhibit with the gang from Asheville Makers.
Not long after building this adult sized Krazy Kar I started thinking about building a robot costume on top of of Krazy Kar. I built this for Maker Faire Atlanta 2015. In the video below I'm using the costume on Vermont Ave in Asheville, NC during Halloween. My wife Anne is walking beside me and she's playing the part of the wacky inventor. Anne's holding a shoe box prop made to look like it's a robot controller (she fooled a lot of people with that!).
Here are a few more photos of my robot in action during halloween.
Here's more video of my robot costume in action during halloween 2018:
I occasionally play music at the Saluda Grade Cafe in Saluda, NC (near Asheville, NC). The video below was shot on June 27, 2014. The tune is called "Big Scioto" (sigh-oh-tee).
The musicians:
PROJECT OVERVIEW
High school students design appropriate Assistive Technology solutions for elementary students with physical and cognitive disabilities.
WHO
Ten high school students enrolled in a year-long Computer Science course taught by Joe Speier at the Asheville School , a college preparatory school located in West Asheville. These ten students participated in a special project-based Engineering Design class taught by Tom Heck during the month of May 2014.
Working in teams, the Asheville School students designed and and built prototypes of appropriate Assistive Technology solutions for exceptional students enrolled at Hall Fletcher Elementary School (HFE) located in Asheville, NC. The design solutions were intended to help students interact with computer programs (games) in new ways. We worked closely with Kelly Blount and Amy Floyd, the HFE special education teaching team, throughout the project. This project was endorsed by Dr. Gordon Grant, who was the award winning school principal at HFE at the time.
BACKGROUND
Jason Webb developed a “DIY Assistive Technology project” outlined in detail HERE. Inspiration for this project came from Jason's work.
Lucas Steuber is a colleague of Jason Webb's, and like Jason, is also blazing a trail with DIY Assistive Technology. Lucas was very helpful throughout this project.
The Assistive Technology prototypes we created utilized a versatile computer interface design platform called a Makey Makey which was developed at the MIT Media Lab. The Makey Makey is a $50 invention kit for the 21st century. It turns everyday objects into touchpads allowing for quick prototyping of creative Assistive Technology solutions.
I was inspired by Purdue University's "EPICS" High School program (Engineering Projects in Community Service) which teaches human centered design and engineering by getting students out into the community to solve real problems for real people.
During this short course I introduced the students to Stanford University's Design School process.
SCHEDULE
April 1-30 -- I call a list of agencies who can help me connect with a group of students with physical disabilities. These agencies include: FIRST Community Resource Center, Asheville City Schools Foundation, Buncombe County School's Progressive Education Program (PEP), Asheville City Schools Exceptional Children's Program, Care Partners, Buncombe County Schools "Special Services", Mission Children's Hospital, Muscular Dystrophy Association, Bureau of Vocational Rehabilitation, North Carolina Assistive Technology Program, Disability Partners, Carolina Pediatric Therapy, and others. I worked with Charlie Glazener, the media contact for the Asheville City Schools system to secure permission to take photos and video of the elementary students.
May 1, 2014 -- Class # 1 (90 min.) Asheville School students board a bus and travel to HFE to meet with the teachers and students. The goal for this trip was to build rapport and empathy (step #1 of the Stanford D-School process).
May 2 -- Class # 2 (45 min.) Asheville School students are introduced to the Makey Makey.
May 8 -- Class # 3 (90 min.) Asheville School students select the game they intend to play and begin building prototype.
May 12 -- Class # 4 (45 min.) Asheville School students refine designs and test each other's designs. Prepare for Class #5 (return to HFE).
May 15 -- Class #5 (90 min.) Asheville School students travel to HFE by bus and meet with the students to test their prototypes (see video above).
May 19 -- Class #6 (45 min.) Asheville School students debrief the experience.
RESOURCES
Jason Webb's "Instructable" on DIY Assistive Technology HERE
Another resource from Jason HERE
Makey Makey blog post about Assistive Technology is HERE.
Overview of the Makey Makey for educators of students with diverse needs HERE
DIY Ability website HERE
Makey Makey website HERE
Makey Makey "LABZ" website HERE
Makey Makey for Computer Access workshop (video) HERE -- NOTE: A guest on this show is one of the developers of the Makey Makey!
Dr. Amy Hurst at the University of Maryland Baltimore is doing amazing work around DIY Assistive Technology.
Switch Accessible Games
Car (driving) games HERE
Learn how to download flash games HERE
RESEARCH: Evaluating Accessibility in Fabrication Tools for Children (click link below)
Download RESEARCH Evaluating Accessibility in Fabrication Tools for Children
Ultimate DIY Pressure Plate Switch is HERE
GAMES
The following is a list of computer games we were prepared to play with the HFE students.
Hopper Beetle Download Hopper_Beetle
Ultimate Baseball Download Ultimate_baseball
Dance Revolution Download Dance_revolution
Dance of the Robots Download Dance_of_the_Robots
Fruit Basket Fruit Basket Game
Piano for Makey Makey Piano
Bongos Bongos
Trebuchet Launch Download Castle-clout
Photo Gallery
View the photo gallery of this project HERE.
Print Media
A brief mention of this project appeared in the Asheville Citizen Times. Click on the image below to enlarge.
WLOS TV, the local ABC news affiliate, did a story on this project.
Longer video showing students using the Assistive Technology devices:
more soon...
On March 20, 2014 Asheville Makers led a "Learn To Solder" event at the West Asheville Library.
It was the first free and open to the public learn how to solder event ever held in Asheville and it was a huge success.
We had students age 8 to 80 learning how to solder a blinking "robot badge" found at the Maker Shed.
Because of generous donations from area businesses, this event was free! Big thank you goes out to Efficiency Lab and On Haywood.
Thank you to all of our great soldering teachers. Without you this would not have been the great event it was.
Avi Silverman and Tom Heck of Asheville Makers recently met with representatives of the Asheville City - Buncombe County Library System who are very excited about the Maker Movement. We'll be partnering to lead more free and open to the public events!
On March 12, 2014 I visited A.J. Whittenberg Elementary School of Engineering in Greenville, SC and led three 90 minute hovercraft workshops (one for each of the three 5th grade classes).
Read an article about this amazing school in The Atlantic CLICK HERE
Here's the 2 minute highlight video:
The workshop starts with a discussion comparing Engineering and Science. We then discuss the Engineering Design Process and compare it to the Scientific Method. Then we discuss friction and determine if it is good or bad. This leads to a discussion about hovercrafts, friction, and "lift". Then we start building mini hovercrafts out of old CDs and balloons.
We then discuss the difference between "lift" and "thrust" -- both are critical for hovercraft locomotion. Students experiment with a balloon as it provides thrust.
With an understanding of lift and thrust it's time to ride the big hovercraft powered by a leaf blower.
At the end of the day I led a 60 minute workshop for the teaching staff on "How To Teach Leadership in the Engineering Classroom". This is a fun, experiential workshop that got the teachers talking about leadership and teamwork in their classroom. I led activities found in the IATF Team Building Games Archive found inside the IATF Members Only Area.
Big thanks to Mr. Hamilton Parks of A.J. Whittenberg School of Engineering who made this day possible.
Educator Robert Pronovost describes how he is working to create Makerspaces in schools.
Making a Makerspace in Schools
Rockets made from paper and powered by compressed air are one of my favorite projects to lead with kids.
A quick google search will point you to several launcher designs and I've included the design I most like below. Click on the link below to download the PDF.
Download Rocket_launcher_plans
Although the above plans do work, I've made some improvements to the pressurization valve and the air release system.
Click on the photo below to view larger version of the pressurization valve (different than what is shown in the plans above).
I've replaced the 3/4 inch "ball valve" (item # 13 in the plans) with a battery operated sprinkler valve I purchased through amazon. You can find this valve at amazon by searching for:
Orbit 57100 3/4-Inch Female Pipe Threaded Auto Inline Sprinkler Valve
The above valve easily replaces the 3/4 ball valve described in the plans. The sprinkler valve works well with a simple 9 volt battery. I purchased the black plastic box that holds the battery at Radio Shack. The "launch activator" was made from PVC pipe I had laying around and the red button that completes the circuit (battery, sprinkler valve, launch activator) was purchased at Radio Shack. The battery box hinge is a piece of black duct tape. I keep the lid closed with velcro. The box is attached to the PVC pipe with a hose clamp.
The sprinkler valve is superior to the ball valve because it releases air quicker allowing you to launch rockets higher with lower air pressure. A well made paper rocket will launch hundreds of feet in the air with only 45 pounds of pressure when using the sprinkler valve. To get that same kind of elevation with the ball valve you would need a much higher pressure (90 psi).
Below I've attached a one page PDF "template" that, if printed on a sheet of 8.5 x 11 paper or card stock, allows you to make a rocket. See the video below at the bottom of this post to learn how to make a rocket from the PDF template.
Download Maker_rocket_template_022314
If this type of thing interests you than please check out MAKE Magazine and attend a Maker Faire. I'm a member of the Asheville Maker Community.
Watch the video below to learn how to make a rocket using the template found above.
FDNSC "Introduction to Engineering" class:
CLICK HERE to view the Introduction to Electronics website
Bruce Molsky rocks.
Adam Hurt playing a gourd banjo and Matthew Olwell flatfooting at The Garage in Charlottesville VA, June 29th, 2011. The tunes are John Riley the Shepherd / Brushy Fork of John's Creek.