THE INVENTABLES WORKSHOP

This week, our Carvey update is all about packaging! You know that feeling you get when a package you've been waiting for arrives damaged? It’s not so fun. We realize if you waited this long for a Carvey and that happened, you’d be upset (and rightfully so). Our goal is to get Carvey to you safely and in excellent condition. To ensure this, we went through a very rigorous test defined by the International Safe Transit Association (ISTA). It's called Test Procedure 3A, and it's designed to challenge the strength of product packaging. I was explaining this to one of our backers, and he said, "Oh, the test must be like this!": While a little different from the video above, the testing sequences are still pretty intense. They try to simulate worst case conditions as a package travels from our warehouse to your doorstep. They change the temperature, drop it 8 times from 18 inches and 1 time from 36 inches on each face of the package, vibrate it to simulate drivi

Meet Chris de Graaf. He’s from Norway, and he makes cool stuff on his X-Carve. Chris came up with the awesome idea to use the parts from two different RC cars to create one super car. Chris transformed the already popular Axial Yeti XL into “one of the craziest RC cars in the industry!” Using his X-Carve , Chris built a new base to hold the two car halves together. He made the base from Delrin for sturdiness. He also built vertical carbon fiber upright supports for additional strength. Chris was able to double the power of his original Axial Yeti XL by adding two motors, two transmission cases and four 3S batteries. What’s the only downside to this sweet project ? Oh yea, we can’t drive it.

Want to create a fun, but useful toy for the kids? Let the Inventables team help inspire you to make the best gift ever. Because why buy when you can make! 1. Connect Four Game Make any night game night by carving your own game board! Check out this super awesome and portable Connect Four Game , crafted by Bob Clagett from ‘I Like To Make Stuff’. ( View Project ) 2. Personalized Puzzle Looking for an educational gift? Teach the kiddos about numbers and shapes with a personalized puzzle . ( View Project ). 3. Dinosaur Bookend Does the little one you know love to read? Keep their books upright with a dinosaur bookend . ( View Project ) For more great ideas of what to make with X-Carve , visit the Inventables project page !

This week we’re going to talk about speeds & feeds. If we do our jobs right, you won’t need to worry about them with Carvey. Allow us to explain the exciting things we’ve been working on:   At the end of the day we want you to have the best looking parts possible straight out of the machine. Sometimes, you might need to do a little sanding, but we are aiming to give you the best possible finish without much extra work. In the Carvey Kickstarter campaign we talked about all the different materials you can use with Carvey. When we designed our Easel software we thought it would be good to have default carve settings built in for each one. Traditionally, software and machines are optimized for flexibility rather than ease of use. Our goal with Carvey was to make 3D carving easy and intuitive. Traditional machinists use the catchall term “speeds & feeds” to describe a set of interrelated variables, including how deep the bit will dig into the material, how quickly it m

Halloween is right around the corner. Let’s see what our Inventables community members are making with Easel and X-Carve that might spook the neighbors. Festive Pumpkin Sign        Inventables customer Rusty made this Halloween project using Easel and X-Carve . The pumpkin was carved from MDF , then spray painted orange. We think it turned out great! ( View project ) Trick-or-Treat Bag Have the most stylish trick-or-treat bag on the block! Dynamic husband and wife duo Steve and Stephanie carved their own stamps using 3 pieces of MDF , one for each color of the pumpkin. Then they created a template to position those 3 stamps on the bag, achieving a block printing effect. Pretty awesome, huh? ( View project ) Window Decorations How cool is this idea? Joseph Smith carved these spooky Halloween decorations from 2 color HDPE plastic. The top layer is black and the bottom layer is white.  He carved awa

If you don't already know Bob Clagett, he's a great guy and sincere lead-by-example teacher in the Maker Community community. Bob wants to not only teach people how to make things, but also inspire them to follow their own curiosity.  Bob Clagett is well-known for his how-to website and YouTube channel, ' I Like to Make Stuff '. On his sites, Bob posts step-by-step instructions on a wide variety of projects and topics meant for all skill levels.   Bob stopped by our office for a tour a little while back: And he's been working on some projects using his X-Carve!

We started with a dream.  Wow America responded! We got 534 schools that applied to the Inventables 50 States Program.  It shows the interest in 3D carving is exploding. We got applications from every state in the Union!  We even got a few from Europe which was kinda funny.  The states people keep asking about are Alaska, Hawaii, and Rhode Island.  They all had great submissions! As of today Round 2 of the selection process has officially begun. Inventables will be donating 3D carving machines to K-12, High Schools, Community Colleges and Universities in all 50 states. We were blown away at how many people applied.  Your energy and effort on this project has been tremendous.  It really shows what we can do as a nation with a little bit of focused effort. We have decided to keep the momentum going and every school will advance to round 2. Please submit your lesson plan explaining how you will incorporate the 3D carver into your curriculum. Please include a section on the o

We are getting really close to shipping Carvey to all our Kickstarter backers. Our vendors are sending the remaining parts via air shipments, many of which are already en route. More details to come, along with the date we will start shipping (we need all the parts to arrive safely and pass inspection first). We’ve given you a bunch of updates on the Carvey hardware lately. Meanwhile, our software engineering team has been working on Easel, the free software that controls Carvey. The tight integration between Easel and Carvey is what really makes the experience great. Today, I’m going to give a quick update on their work and show a project that utilizes the new software features. Easel App Store Our engineering team spent a good portion of the summer building our own engine for Easel. They also built an API so third-party developers can make apps, and we rolled out a beta version of the Easel App Store. This has already yielded really helpful add-ons that can be used withi