Our next social gathering will be on Sunday 19th April. You can get your FREE tickets here…

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/medway-makers-tinker-build-create-tickets-1984372753323

Note you are most welcome, ven if you just want to come, drink tea and watch.

Why Maker Spaces Matter for Our Community

Have you ever wanted to learn a new skill but didn’t know where to start? Maybe you’ve got a project idea bouncing around your head but lack the tools or the space to make it happen. Or perhaps you’re just looking for a way to connect with like-minded people. This is where maker spaces come in, and why they’re so important to communities like ours.

Maker spaces, like Medway Makers, are more than just workshops. They are vibrant hubs of creativity and collaboration where people of all ages and backgrounds can come together to learn, build, and share. They are built on a simple but powerful idea: that by providing access to tools, resources, and a supportive community, we can empower people to turn their ideas into reality.

A Place to Learn and Grow

One of the biggest benefits of a maker space is the opportunity to learn new skills in a practical, hands-on way. Whether you’re interested in 3D printing, laser cutting, electronics, or even traditional woodworking, you’ll find the equipment and, most importantly, the people who can guide you. You don’t need to be an expert to walk through the door. The only requirement is curiosity. Many of our members have found a passion for things they never thought they’d try, from building custom PC cases to programming microcontrollers.

Collaboration and Shared Knowledge

Maker spaces thrive on collaboration. Instead of working alone in a garage or shed, you’re surrounded by people with different skills and experiences. This creates a natural environment for sharing knowledge. Got a problem with a project? Chances are someone nearby has faced a similar challenge and can offer advice. This kind of organic learning is incredibly valuable and often leads to new friendships and joint projects. I’ve personally seen members team up to tackle everything from complex robotics to restoring old electronics, all because they met and connected at the space.

Battling Loneliness

In an increasingly digital world, it’s easy to feel isolated. Maker spaces offer a tangible solution to this by providing a welcoming physical space for people to gather. For someone who might be feeling lonely, a maker space can be a lifeline. It’s a place to talk, to laugh, and to work alongside others. The shared focus on making and creating breaks down social barriers, making it easier to strike up conversations and form genuine connections. It’s a place where you can find a sense of belonging and a supportive community.

Ultimately, a maker space is a reflection of the community it serves. It’s a place where we can all learn, create, and grow together. So if you’ve been thinking about a project, want to learn something new, or simply want to meet some interesting people, come and see what we’re all about. You might be surprised at what you can achieve.

Come join us on our WhatsApp Community if you wish to chat with fellow makers and creatives in North Kent.

https://chat.whatsapp.com/CgaAsMea4EfJLFpDF7cMEI

Whether you’re a seasoned expert in electronics, a skilled coder, or someone who’s curious about starting their journey into the world of DIY tech projects, Medway Makers offers a welcoming and inspiring environment to exchange ideas, learn new skills, and collaborate on exciting projects. From Arduino and Raspberry Pi to drone flying and digital fabrication, there’s something for everyone at our meetups.

No special equipment or prior knowledge of anything is required. Total beginners welcome.

Hello Makers and Innovators!

Have you ever had an incredible idea but lacked the skills to bring it to life? Ever wondered how professionals create intricate 3D designs for groundbreaking products? Well, this is your chance to dive into the exciting world of 3D design and modeling with Fusion 360!

📅 Save the Date!
Join us at Medway Makers for an exclusive, hands-on Introduction to Fusion 360 session that will elevate your maker game to new heights!

🎟️ Why Should You Attend?

🌟 Beginner-Friendly: Never touched 3D modeling software before? No problem! This session is designed to accommodate complete beginners.
🌟 Comprehensive Learning: Learn to create 3D models, simulate real-world scenarios, and even venture into CAM and 3D printing capabilities.
🌟 Expert Guidance: Get step-by-step guidance from our knowledgeable instructor, Mike, who has a wealth of experience in technology and building.
🌟 Network: Meet like-minded individuals who share your passion for making, coding, and innovation.
🌟 Free Admission: That’s right, attending this enriching session won’t cost you a penny!

👩‍🎓👨‍🎓 Who Should Attend?
Makers, hobbyists, students, professionals, and anyone with a flair for creativity and innovation are all welcome!

🎫 Secure Your Spot Today!
Seats are limited, so make sure to grab your free ticket as soon as possible.

See you at Medway Makers, where your imagination meets the tools to bring it to life!

Get your free ticket to our events on EventBrite. Click HERE.

Hello everyone!

Are you curious about the world of coding but don’t know where to start? Have you ever looked at the matrix of code behind a video game or a website and wondered, “How does it all work?” Or maybe, you’ve thought, “Could I create something like this?”

If you’ve answered “yes” to any of these questions, we have the perfect event for you! Medway Makers invites you to our special gathering on Sunday, 20th August. It’s the perfect opportunity for anyone, yes anyone, to begin their journey into the fascinating world of coding.

Our primary tools are the Arduino, Raspberry Pi, and the Godot Game Engine – three very powerful, yet beginner-friendly platforms that have brought about some of the greatest innovations in technology today. They provide an excellent foundation for beginners and are also rewarding for those with some experience.

But, what if I have never coded before?

Great! Then you’re exactly the person we want to see. At Medway Makers, we believe that everyone can learn to code. In fact, the only requirement to start coding is curiosity and a willingness to learn. It may sound cliché, but with coding, every master truly was once a beginner.

What can I expect?

You’ll be diving right in, working hands-on with Arduino boards and Raspberry Pi microcomputers to create amazing mini-projects that actually work! These platforms are excellent for learning the basics of programming in a fun, practical way.

But the fun doesn’t stop there. You’ll also get to work with the Godot Game Engine. If you’ve ever dreamt of creating your own video game, this is your chance. Godot is a powerful tool that lets you create games right from scratch and it’s perfect for beginners.

Who will be there to guide me?

Our friendly community of Medway Makers is always ready to share their knowledge. Don’t worry if you get stuck, there will always be someone around to help you. You’ll be part of a collaborative and supportive environment, where making mistakes and learning from them is the norm.

Why should I start now?

There’s never been a better time to learn to code. With the increasing digitalization of our world, coding skills are more in-demand than ever before. Coding can boost your problem-solving skills, creativity, and even your career opportunities. Plus, it’s just incredibly satisfying to see your own creation come to life!

But, will I enjoy it?

Absolutely! Coding isn’t just about typing on a computer. It’s about bringing ideas to life, solving puzzles, and creating something from nothing. It’s about the excitement when your project finally works, and the satisfaction of knowing that you made it yourself.

So, come and join us on Sunday, 20th August, at Medway Makers. Bring along your curiosity, creativity, and a sense of adventure. Start your journey in the world of coding and prepare to have lots of fun along the way. We can’t wait to see you there!

No prior experience is required, just an interest in learning and a willingness to have fun. Take the first step on your coding journey with Medway Makers. Mark the date in your calendar, and we’ll see you there!

Discover the joy of coding. Unlock a world of digital possibilities. Join the makers. Your journey starts with us, at Medway Makers.

by Tom Sparrow

Back in 2016 Medway Makers were the first place winners in our class at the Pi Wars robotic competition at Cambridge University. Part of Medway Makers prizes for winning at PiWars was a Raspberry Pi audio amplifier hat and this device was the perfect opportunity to bring an old retro ‘Hacker’ (Yes, it really is called that)  radio up to date and into the 21st century.

The radio was taken apart and I everything inside the radio that was no longer going to be used was discarded. Then, a Raspberry Pi with the amplifier hat was added inside and I soldered the output to the original radio’s speaker.

There are several software choices to use for your internet radio, and I decided to use Volume IO. This was flashed to the micro SD card of the Raspberry pi. Volume IO has a nice, easy to use web interface, the official app works well, and it’s easy to add your own music collection via a USB stick.

 

Over the Christmas period, Mike was lucky enough to be gifted a BBC Master 128 along with a 5.25″ disc drive, a load of cables and a few games on tape. The poor BBC Master had been sat in a garage for approximately 10 years with a load of wood on top of it, gathering dust and becoming a home for spiders and beetles. Obviously, the computer was in need of some essential TLC before it could be put into use.

First, the BBC Master needed a good strip down and a clean. The PSU, motherboard and keyboard were all removed from the case. The case was full of dust, dead spiders and beetles and was very dirty. The keyboard was absolutely filthy and was first to be stripped down and cleaned. All of the keys were taken off and given a good wash in soapy water, the chassis was cleaned up as best as possible with some brushes and cotton buds and then the whole thing reassembled. The final result was a massive improvement.

Next, the two sides of the clamshell case were washed in the shower with hot soapy water to remove all of the dirt. The case is very heavily yellowed with age and a future project for the summer is to carry out the retrobright process on the case to bring it back to white again. Next, the motherboard was given a vacuum and the board a brush and wipe down.

Next, the PSU needed some work. There are three capacitors in the BBC Power Supplies that are notorious for drying out over the 30+ years it has been since they were manufactured and when they get hot they emit smoke and die. Mike purchased a capacitor replacement kit from eBay and the three offending items were replaced. The existing capacitors did look like they were in good shape, but it was better to be safe than sorry. 

Finally, the battery pack needed replacing. The pack had the original Duracell batteries from the 1980’s and they had leaked all over the place. The pack was thrown away and replaced with a newly made pack using a 3 AA battery holder, diode and resistor.

Next, it was time to install the TurboSPI ROM chip and the SD Card adapter that was purchased at the same time as the capacitor kit. This would allow instant loading of games and other programs from the SD card and allows up to 512 disc images to be loaded onto the card. This was a simple case of pushing the ROM into an empty slot and pushing the SD card PCB into the user port on the underside of the computer.

Now everything was setup and ready to go, it was time to turn the computer on and hope it all worked. Voila! Everything worked fine.

After a few configuration commands were typed in to reset the configuration after it being turned off for so long and the battery pack no longer providing backup power, the Turbo MMC system was available and the contents of the SD Card could be accessed.

On the SD Card that came with the system are well over 1000 games that can be accessed from a menu system on Disc 0. These only take up around 50% of the available 512 disc slots leaving plenty empty to load your own games or to save your own programs to. All of the classics were present.

The BBC Master 128 proved to be a big hit at the next Medway Maker social meetup on Sunday 5th January with several members getting very competitive at Pacmanand a few other games.

There are a few more upgrades on the horizon with a Raspberry Pi co-processor on its way and a ROM for a BBC Master 128 specific MAMMFS file system so that Elite can be played properly.

You can see the BBC Master in use in this timelapse movie below of the last Medway Makers session on Sunday 5th January 2020.

 

So it is now just 6 days to go until the Sunday of Pi Wars. This is the last weekend to get things sorted before the big day. So we’ve been frantically 3D Printing and testing.

For the Somewhere Over The Rainbow challenge we were concerned about the way the course was going to be lit. There was no confidence that illumination would be even and that our robot would not cast shadows onto the ball (It’s a pretty tall robot). So we have added some LED lights to the camera side of the robot to hopefully give the camera a better view and to ensure the robot is not thrown off by shadows. We have yet to test this though!

The golf attachment has been through a few revisions as it was found to be very difficult to control in testing. The printer is beavering away right now printing out the new parts.

The Duck Shoot stuff is all working great. Shame it is taking up the majority of the internals of the robot though. Space is tight inside there!

The Minimal Maze challenge is working fine. We are just praying for no bright sun on the day as this will ruin everything as we have not had time to fit any backup sensors.

The straight line speed test works fine. We are not going to be the fastest robot out there (I’ve seen some videos of super fast competitors). However, we are confident we will get from one end to the other without touching the wall so will at least collect some points.

Finally there is the obstacle challenge, which is mainly down to practise as well as Pi Noon.

All in all we have had a bloody good crack at this competition and although we are not fully prepared as we hoped we would be we should be a strong team. Fingers crossed for the day. It will be great fun and we are all looking forward to it. I am personally looking forward to getting my life back past Pi Wars and have the time to get on with some of my own personal projects. The last 8-9 months or so has been dominated by Pi Wars and it will be nice to finally get it done and get things back to normal.

However, I now have some fantastic new skills since starting the Pi Wars competition that will be invaluable for some of my up and coming projects and for that I am very grateful.

Hope to see you all in Cambridge next week. Please come along and support us !

 

With just 10 days to go till the Sunday that we are competing in Pi Wars, panic is now setting in. We have to admit we are not completely ready and really need another few weeks to get things right. However, we don’t have that luxury. There are 10 days to the competition and considering 6 of those are work days meaning only a few hours in the evening are available during the week, plus once we set off for Cambridge on the Friday any chance to work on the robot after that will be very limited indeed. So this coming weekend is really the last chance to do as much as possible on the robot. After that, time has ran out.

Where did all of that time go? It was way back in 2017 that work started on the robot and thinking we had plenty of time. All of a sudden we are in headless chicken territory and needing more time.

So this is a brief status update on where we are as of today :-

Chassis – Happy with the chassis and we’ve added a little bit of bling to make it look less like an RC car and more like a robot.

Straight Line Speed Test – Not confident about this challenge. Using ToF sensors only so we are weather dependent on this one. No time to add in backup sensors.

Maze – Same as above. Good results in testing but praying for overcast skies on the day.

Somewhere Over The Rainbow. – Robot performs well in testing. Again, lighting conditions on the day that differ drastically from those in testing may be our downfall.

Obstacle Course – This one is entirely down to the skill of the driver. The robot is fast and maneuverable. Hoping to do reasonably well on this one.

Pi Noon – As above. But we are up against formidable opponents so don’t expect to win. Hoping to get at least half way through the rounds though.

Golf – Attachment works reasonably well in testing. Luck and driver skill will need to be on our side.

Duck Shoot – Hoping to do well in this one. We have a nice Nerf Cannon. But then so do other teams so again, speed and luck are required here.

Blogging – We’ve definitely done better than most teams as a lot haven’t even bothered. Hoping for good scores here.

Artistic Merit – Hoping for some points here as we’ve put some effort into making it look good.

Technical Merit – Hundreds of hours have been spent in Fusion 360 and with the 3D printer on the robot. Almost every single plastic part on it was designed from scratch with many iterations in the R&D phase till we had working versions. The Nerf Cannon in particular went through many changes till we got what we wanted. Hopefully high scores here.

So, we are not expecting to win any challenges, but will be trying our damnedest to do so. No matter how we do on the day, I am sure it will still be great fun and I am walking away with some great new skills with Python, OpenCV, Fusion 360 and 3D Printing that will be very useful for up and coming personal projects and those with Medway Makers. It will also be great to put some faces to names of those we have been speaking to on the Pi Wars Discord channel and on Twitter. One thing I’ve loved about the active guys and gals on Discord (not including the ‘lurkers’) is the willingness to share information and help each other, even between competing teams. This sums up the spirit of Pi Wars and the Raspberry Pi community as a whole and I applaud every person involved in this great hobby.

It is now only 35 days to go until the Sunday Pi Wars day and the pressure is mounting. The reality is, we need more time, another 3 months would be great. The reality also is, we don’t have that luxury. Pi Wars is in 35 days whether we are ready or not.

We made some good progress on the Nerf Cannon this weekend and (finally) have a design we are happy with after many iterations. The gun has plenty of power and the addition of the laser sight will help with aiming.  The problem now is finding where to mount it. The chassis is a total mess and needs sorting out. So, I am frantically printing out parts to hang things under and off the sides of the robot to make more space up top to mount the Nerf Cannon and Pi Camera. The attachments for the golf course and the maze sensors will go at either end and around the sides.

We are getting there slowly but things now need to pick up pace. Tom has been busy working away building our test courses whilst Mike cracks on with the 3D printing and coding. Considering it is only a 2 man team, we’ve done really well and have a half decent robot. Looking at what some of the other teams have built it is clear we are up against some very tough competition. As our first entry into Pi Wars as a maker-space we do no expect to  come near the top 10 but will do our best to get as many points as we possibly can. We have certainly learnt a great deal and will be far better equipped to tackle the competition again if we decide to enter another year. Plenty of valuable lessons have been learnt.

However, no matter how we do I am sure it is going to be a great fun day on 22nd April. Even if we don’t win any challenges we’ve learnt loads of new skills and I am now very proficient at building working parts in Fusion 360. The skills I’ve learnt in the Pi Wars build will go a long way towards my own personal ‘Earth Rover’ project which I plan to start once Pi Wars is out of the way later in the year. Tom is picking up tons of Fusion 360 skills which he plans in using to assist with his kids school projects. These are the main rewards of entering a competition like this, the experiences you can take away from it and put to use elsewhere in your life. We are really looking forward to Pi Wars. See you all there!

 

Over the last few weeks I’ve gone through several design iterations for the Nerf Cannon. This is mainly due to my insistence in trying to use a continuous rotation modded servo to move the darts into position. I have finally given in and used a stepper motor. This is something I should have done right from the start with hindsight.

However, the darts are now lining up perfectly with the gun barrel every time now and the 3D printer is busy beavering away printing out what I hope will be the final version of the gun. Once the gun is finished and fully working I shall post up a video of it in action.