The Editors of Make: - The Best of Instructables, Volume I: DIY Projects from the World’s Biggest Show & Tell

The Best of Instructables

by the editors of MAKE magazine and Instructables

Copyright 2009 Maker Media, Inc. All rights reserved.

Printed in U.S.A.

Published by Maker Media,

1005 Gravenstein Highway North Sebastopol, CA 95472

Maker Media books may be purchased for educational, business, or sales promotional use. For more information, contact O'Reilly Media's corporate/institutional sales department: 800-998-9938 or corporate@oreilly.com.

Print History: October 2008: First Edition

October 2013: Second Printing

Publisher: Dale Dougherty

Associate Publisher: Dan Woods

Executive Editor: Brian Jepson

Creative Director: Daniel Carter

Lead Editor: Gareth Branwyn

Assistant Editors: Patti Schiendelman,

Eric J. Wilhelm (for Instructables)

Designers: Sutton Long and Gretchen J. Bay

Production Manager: Terry Bronson

Indexer: Patti Schiendelman

The Make logo and Maker Media logo are registered trademarks of Maker Media, Inc. The Best of Instructables, and related trade dress are trademarks of Maker Media, Inc. The trademarks of third parties used in this work are the property of their respective owners.

Important Message to Our Readers: Your safety is your own responsibility, including proper use of equipment and safety gear, and determining whether you have adequate skill and experience. Chemicals, electricity, and other resources used for these projects are dangerous unless used properly and with adequate precautions, including safety gear. Some illustrative photos do not depict safety precautions or equipment, in order to show the project steps more clearly. These projects are not intended for use by children.

Use of the instructions and suggestions in The Best of Instructables is at your own risk. Maker Media, Inc. and the authors disclaim all responsibility for any resulting damage, injury, or expense. It is your responsibility to make sure that your activities comply with applicable laws, including copyright.

ISBN-13: 978-0-596-51952-0

Contents

Preface

When we decided to collaborate with Eric Wilhelm and the folks at Instructables on a best-of book, we knew it was going to be fun and challenging, we had no idea just how fun and how challenging. We also had no idea how deeply interwoven wed all become with the Instructables community itself.

The book youre holding represents the enthused effort of hundreds of people. As the staffs at MAKE and Instructables were busy choosing our favorite projects, Instructables ran a contest so members could choose their favorites. Thousands of votes were cast. The top 75 can be seen starting on page 304. Projects chosen by both the editors and the community have a special Contest Winner! icon throughout the book.

Translating web content to a book is challenging, especially when youre dealing with so many contributors. These are not professional writers or photographers. These are people who are passionate about the things they create and about sharing the results of their effort with others. We tried not to tinker too much with their voice, letting different styles and personalities shine through (glare and all) as much as possible. The authors couldnt have been more generous, taking new pics when possible, correcting errors, proofing layouts, and offering us constant support and encouragement. To all of them we give a resounding Thank you!

A book can only capture some of what the Web has to offer. For each of these projects, a web address is listed at the bottom. Before building a project, go to the Instructable page, check out the additional images and videos, read the comments, and look for updates and corrections.

While this book may represent some of the best projects on Instructables, through this process, we discovered that the best of Instructables is really the community it engenders. The best of Instructables is the willingness of those involved to roll up their sleeves and help out (when you spend your time hanging out on a how to site, can do is the pervading ethos). And ultimately, the best of Instructables is the itchy excitement one feels while browsing these projects. Its no exaggeration to tell you that it was all we could do, as we edited these pages, to resist the urge to abandon our desktops for our workbenches and start making stuff.

From all of us, editors Gareth Branwyn, Brian Jepson, and Patti Schiendelman; project manager Terry Bronson; designers Sutton Long and Gretchen Bay; art director Daniel Carter; Eric J. Wilhelm and the team at Instructables; and the wonderful worldwide community of Instructable authors, we hope you have as much fun making the projects in The Best of Instructables as we did in making the book.

The Editors

Welcome

Making things by hand is cool again.

You can be a creator, not just a consumer. Whether youre into screen-printing T-shirts, soldering LEDs, modding pre-fab furniture, building robots, or just making dinner, youre a part of the Maker movement that calls Instructables.com its online home.

Instructables is a place where artists, bicyclists, crafters, engineers, modders, cooks, tinkerers, and techies gather to share advice and ideas freely, and post thousands of their fantastic projects. Were excited to finally bring you the best of Instructables in print. We think its a great introduction to the incredible variety of what you can make and do, and will hopefully inspire you to get started on great projects of your own.

Instructables is my biggest project. It all started when I took up kitesurfing while finishing up my Ph.D. in mechanical engineering at MIT. Kitesurfing equipment (modified surfboards, and giant kites to pull you around on them) was still new, and far too expensive for my graduate student budget, so I designed, built, and tested my own gear. I documented the designs and results on my personal website, and got email from lots of people who wanted to ask for advice, share their ideas and pictures, and meet me at the beach. Unfortunately, this took just as long as making the equipment in the first place. It was clear we needed a better way to share our projects online.

Instructables was one of the first ideas to come out of Squid Labs, the innovation research and design firm I started with some of my grad school kitesurfing buddies. We started using the step-by-step format to document our own projects, and liked it so much that we decided to give our friends access. Word spread quickly, and soon people wed never met were posting fantastic projects. It quickly became clear Instructables was going to be huge, so I spun it off from Squid Labs (see my How To Start a Business Instructable www.instructables.com/id/How_to_Start_a_Business_1 for more information) and built an awesome team to help it keep growing, and to provide a place for all sorts of great projects and discussions.

When someone builds, bakes, or creates something theyre proud of, they often put it on the coffee table so visitors will ask how did you do that? I think of Instructables as an online coffee tablea place for you to put your projects on display, show off your skills and creativity, and start interesting conversations with the people who stop by to check them out.

I find it deeply satisfying that this book will rest on many homemade coffee tables, and be stacked on crazy custom bookshelves. These awesome projects give you a taste of Instructables, and the sorts of creative things our online community has to offer. Get inspired by these projects, then check out the Instructables website for the full build details. Leave the author a message online, and if you try their project, take a picture and post it in the Comments.