Latest member news 7 April 2017

Hello all,

Spring is here, and with it another roundup of news from Makespace.

Report from the Science Festival

There were three Makespace events in the recent Cambridge Science Festival, all a great success. At our fourth birthday party and showcase, members of the public came round to see a range of recent members' projects on show and see some of our kit in action. There were lots of exciting things on show, so thanks to everyone who brought something or helped with the event in other ways. David's event teaching kids to program robots, and Sophie's knit-a-neuron event, were both fully booked and very popular, so thanks to them too.

As a result of these events lots of new people are aware of Makespace and there will hopefully be a steady stream of new members over the next couple of months, so if you are a trainer on any equipment, and have a couple of hours to spare, please think about running some equipment inductions.

Run an event at the Festival of Ideas

On a related note, the Cambridge Festival of Ideas will run from 16-29 October 2017, focused around the arts, humanities and social sciences. If you would be interested in running an event at Makespace for the Festival, get in touch. The closing date for submitting proposed events is 29 May.

Free SolidWorks demo

Cadtek, who are a SolidWorks reseller, are running a free introduction to Solidworks at Makespace on Wednesday 24 May, 10am-3pm. Sign up here.

Classroom update

The classroom has recently been repainted, quite a lot of junk removed - thanks to many members for working on this. In addition an electrician has installed trunking with power sockets around the walls. Please run interesting makery events there!

Lease update

We are hoping to sign a new lease with the University in the near future. The Directors have been working to address a number of health and safety concerns to make this possible. This work is now mostly done, with a small number of outstanding matters (concerning e.g. fire procedures, fire door auto-closers, gas bottle permission & notice, and storage). The legal negotiations are complete and the University will sign the lease when the outstanding actions are closed.

Please help keep on top of safety by keeping the space clean and not storing materials where they may obstruct fire exits or constitute a fire or safety hazard.

Darkroom plans

We expect that the signing of the lease will finally enable us to add a darkroom to Makespace. There will be a meeting to discuss the plans for a darkroom on Wed 26 April at 7.30pm in the Classroom. If you'd like to get involved, sign up here.

Safety, fires and lasercutters

A small fire was started by one of the lasercutters recently while cutting 5mm perspex sheet. The member concerned immediately hit the emergency stop and removed the workpiece, and there were no further problems. Our lasercutter training emphasises that the cutters must be supervised at all times, and this incident shows why! Please remember that fires can start with any material, and be vigilant. More generally, remember that lots of our equipment can be dangerous if wrongly used, and follow the safety procedures you have been trained in. If you aren't sure you remember them, ask the equipment's trainers or owners. Thanks to all our trainers and users for continuing to keep Makespace safe.

Science Makers and other happenings

A reminder that many wondrous things happen at events in the Classroom that you can sign up for. See the Meetup calendar for a list. One regular is the monthly Science Makers meetup, where at May's meeting you can come and build a spectrometer.