We are starting the new year with several sessions that will offer a solid introduction to 3D printing. Each will be held from 4-6 p.m. on Sunday afternoons in January (5th, 12th, 19th, and 26th). They will be hosted at the Makerspace and will consist of small groups of 4 learners (and any parents or guardians that need to accompany younger makers)
Enthusiasts of all ages will be receiving 3D printers as a festive gift and will want to learn how to use it. Or you may have received one in the last few years and have found it difficult to use?
You even might be giving someone a printer this Christmas and want to make sure the receiver gets some expert assistance with a very welcome gift of an introductory session. See our buying recommendations.
For a few years, we’ve been helping to repair things that members and the public bring to us. Ideally, we’ve tried to teach the owner how to repair the article, letting them do all the work, but we’ve done the repairs with their help where it was too complex or dangerous to give them the necessary knowledge. We don’t have a dedicated repair event, but you can come to any of our free open meetings, 6:30-8:30 every Wednesday evening, with your broken items. You can alternatively learn to make or upcycle materials at the same meeting!
One of our volunteer experts working inside a computer
Will this cost me anything?
Repairs are nominally free, but we will accept donations to help us keep the place running.
There may be direct costs for materials, such as for 3D printing filament, or for spare parts, such as a new SSD for your laptop. If we don’t have something immediately available, we will give you a link to buy it yourself and you can bring it in to a future session.
Examples
These are just some of the items that we’ve helped members of the community to repair, largely by themselves:
Bad connection inside a Bluetooth speakerNetwork drive needing a replacement discBad connection inside a circular sawScanner with a broken bracketMissing plastic trim on patio doorWooden snake from Egypt, snapped in a suitcase
Other community repair events
We can only handle so much repair volume ourselves (we are available weekly, but we only have one or two repair experts available at each meeting). On the other hand, we do operate in a dedicated workshop and have a wide range of heavy equipment, tools and storage parts, which couldn’t be easily brought to a general repair event!
Woodworking Space3D Printing and Laser Cutting
There are several other local options for you, which might suit your repairing needs better than we do:
For large pieces of furniture, we recommend contacting the Lancaster Men’s Hub. We can probably deal with smaller items like chairs and side tables, but not larger jobs like dining tables.
What about old laptops?
Separate to our Repair Shop, we also refurbish laptops and give them to other local community organisations, charities and refugee groups. Do you have an old machine taking up space in a cupboard? We gave well over 100 usable laptops to schools during COVID lockdown!
We had a couple of sessions at Lancaster library last week, helping young children to design the dimensional objects that we fabricated for them while they waited. Mostly, their drawn designs or ideas were used to create a model using the excellent & free Tinkercad website (tinkercad.com). We even had a retired person give it a go on the day!
We will be back there doing a few more activities in the next few weeks too.
Yesterday, 27th July, 2024, we were part of a mini Fun Palace event, stationed at the Judges’ Lodgings in Lancaster town centre.
We brought parts for Sue’s laser-cut, doll’s size wooden dining chairs and park benches – the public was encouraged to decorate them, glue them together and take them home. We do creative, interactive events like this through the year and always need extra bodies to help out, if you are interested.
Today, we passed on a nice refurbished laptop to Grant, from the Employment Support Team. He took it to give to a vulnerable person, who is trying to get back to work – we wish them the best of luck!
If you have an old computer that you don’t need any more, why not drop it off with us and we can try to give it a good home!
Our last two wood events of the summer are near the beginning of July and on the bank holiday at the end of August. Both of these events are facilitated by Woodies Woodland Craft Training & Education.
We have a couple of whittling events coming up soon, including a full day of woodcrafting fun on August bank holiday, which lets you really get your teeth stuck in! All our events are pay-what-you-can, so we expect them to be very popular indeed, just like the two spoon carving events we’ve already successfully run this year. Both of these events are run by the talented Rick from Woodies Woodland Craft Training & Education.
Yesterday, we were at Tabletop Republic Lancaster, running an event as part of a city-centre wide Lancaster Fun Palace. We try to get involved in local STEAM outreach as often as possible!
Visitor were able to design their own playing cards, using blank cards that we’d cut out with laser beams. They ended up making some very innovative and vibrant designs!
We also had the first playtest of a eco-themed card game that Bil is designing. This will become part of a secret project later in the year! The mechanics were a little off, because we got completely bogged down in pollution really early in the game. Thankfully, real life isn’t quite that punishing. The volunteers gave very useful constructive criticism – thanks!
