Collaborate Disseminate
The humble air compressor is a staple of the modern workshop, underpinning everything from tire inflation to air tools, factory equipment, research gear and paint sprayers. But there’s always a better way to do things, and one California company believ… Continue reading Carnot puts a centrifugal spin on a 500 year old air compressor design
What has dual compressed-air cannons, 500 roll-on deodorant balls, and a machine-learning brain with a bad attitude? We didn’t know either, until [Leo Fernekes] dropped this video on his autonomous robot sentry gun and saw it in action for ourselves.
Now, we’ve seen tons of sentry guns on these pages …read more
Continue reading Autonomous Sentry Gun Packs a Punch and a Ton of Build Tips
Soda Stream machines use a cylinder of compressed CO2 to carbonate beverages, and cylinders that are “empty” for the machine’s purposes in fact still have a small amount of gas left in them. User [Graldur] shared a clever design for using up those last gasps from a cylinder by turning …read more
Continue reading Used Soda Stream Cylinder Becomes DIY Canned Air
If you’re like us, understanding the processes and methods of the early Industrial Revolution involved some hand waving. Take the blast furnace, which relies on a steady supply of compressed air to stoke the fire and supply the oxygen needed to smelt iron from ore. How exactly was air compressed …read more
Continue reading Get Compressed Air From Falling Water With The Trompe
Portable, cordless air-compressors aren’t exactly new, but they’re often bulky, limited in scope and ugly. In response to these issues, a team of engineers and product designers fro Hong Kong has come up with the Norshire Mini. A compact, min… Continue reading Norshire Mini 8-inch portable air-compressor for bike, car and camping
You’ve got to hand it to [Tom Stanton] – he really thinks outside the box. And potentially outside the atmosphere, to wit: we present his reaction control gas thruster-controlled drone.
Before anyone gets too excited, [Tom] isn’t building drones for use in a vacuum, although we can certainly see a …read more
Continue reading Unconventional Drone Uses Gas Thrusters For Control
Fidget spinners were the hottest new craze at one point, but their 15 minutes of fame has well and truly passed. They’re great for fidgeting, and not a whole lot else. One of the main objectives around their use is to spin them as quickly as possible. After [Sushi Ramen] hurt himself after spinning one up with compressed air, however – a new and dangerous idea came to mind.
What you’re looking at is a fidget spinner sword, powered by compressed air. That alone is somewhat of a blessing, as it prevents this horrifying device from being easily man-portable. …read more
Storing electrical energy is a huge problem. A lot of gear we use every day use some form of battery and despite a few false starts at fuel cells, that isn’t likely to change any time soon. However, batteries or other forms of storage are important in many alternate energy schemes. Solar cells don’t produce when it is dark. Windmills only produce when the wind blows. So you need a way to store excess energy to use for the periods when you aren’t creating electricity. [Kris De Decker] has an interesting proposal: store energy using compressed air.
Compressed air storage …read more
Storing electrical energy is a huge problem. A lot of gear we use every day use some form of battery and despite a few false starts at fuel cells, that isn’t likely to change any time soon. However, batteries or other forms of storage are important in many alternate energy schemes. Solar cells don’t produce when it is dark. Windmills only produce when the wind blows. So you need a way to store excess energy to use for the periods when you aren’t creating electricity. [Kris De Decker] has an interesting proposal: store energy using compressed air.
Compressed air storage …read more
Some folks just can’t leave well enough alone, and that often ends up being a good thing. Such is the case with this 3D-printed compressed air engine, which just keeps getting better.
The design has changed a lot since we first covered [Tom Stanton]’s attempts at reviving the powerplant from the glory days of the Air Hogs line of toys, which he subsequently built a plane around. The engine was simple, with a ball valve that admitted air into the cylinder when a spring mounted to the top of the piston popped it out of the way. That spring has …read more
Continue reading Cams and Pushrods Improve 3D-Printed Compressed Air Engine