What have members of Sheffield Hackspace been up to this two-months?
Let’s find out what some members have been up to!
- EMF Camp
- Radical Pride stall
- Solar eclipse of August 12, 2026
- Adam - custom Skadis tool board
- alifeee - Embroidered EMF Camp Patch
- alifeee - keyboard dust cover
- alifeee - GMTK gamejam
- alifeee - tiny sewing toolkit
- alifeee - wizard costume
- Felipe - 1970s computer and emulation drivers
- jon - exotic wood pens
- matthew - cat screen
- matthew - snufkin
- OJ and Matthew - fixing N64 power supply
- OJ - 3D printed ground terminal
EMF Camp
A group picture of a bunch of us from Sheffield Hackspace at EMF Camp 2026!
I also wrote more about the festival on my blog :] — https://blog.alifeee.net/emf-2026/.
Radical Pride stall
Sheffield Hackspace ran a stall at Sheffield Radical Pride in July! :]
We talked to a lot of people, showed off our project book, and ran some activities like finger-loom weaving and lino cutting/printing.
Solar eclipse of August 12, 2026
In August, there was a solar eclipse. It was total through Iceland and Spain, and something like 91% total from the UK.
Many members of the hackspace took pictures or viewed the eclipse from Sheffield :] — here are some methods and pictures that we saw:
The classic pinhole in a cereal box for me.
I managed to hitchhike to Spain in time to see the eclipse:] … I was thinking of looking through a CD, but in the end found some eclipse glasses. I didn’t take a picture of the total eclipse, but I did take a picture of the people who were looking at the eclipse during totality!
I wrote about it more on my blog ;] : https://blog.alifeee.net/solar-eclipse/.
Pinhole in foil on the window onto paper every ten mins until max occlusion
Also helped the kid next door with a colender and binocular projection
iPhone 16.
Greerings front Gdańsk ;D
Still the best filter for eclipse photos.
I used a colander…
Adam - custom Skadis tool board
It took me a moment but most of the tools are now living on the new board. A few last ones are waiting for the new holders in the Laser room. As usual, the “let’s use existing models” mantra has failed and I’ve ended up designing parametric holders in OpenSCAD.
Resources:
- wiki page: https://wiki.sheffieldhackspace.org.uk/public/projects#tool_board
- Skadis board generator: https://cutmaker.co/generators/ikea_skadis
- Skadis board SVG template for the laser (fits the large acrylic boards available in the space): https://github.com/sheffieldhackspace/skadis/blob/main/svg/590x390.svg
- Modified Skadis universal hook (snug fit to match the acrylic board thickness): https://github.com/sheffieldhackspace/skadis/blob/main/stl/Universal%20Hook.stl
- Various STL-s currently used on the board: https://github.com/sheffieldhackspace/skadis/tree/main/stl
- Source code for the Skadis Screwdriver Shelf Generator: https://github.com/dredzik/models-skadis/blob/main/src/Skadis%20Shelf.scad
- Source code for the Skadis Tool Holder Generator: https://github.com/dredzik/models-skadis/blob/main/src/Skadis%20Holder.scad
alifeee - Embroidered EMF Camp Patch
I saw that EMF Camp were selling pin badges, and they had some pictures of them online. I didn’t buy them last time in 2024, but I was sitting next to an embroidery machine, so I thought I’d see if I could make the 2024 version.
I copied the design (via autotracing and manual edits) into Inkscape, and set it up for an embroidery run.
You can see the stages of making a patch here: tacking stitch, followed by design, followed by a merrow around the edge (also see these on the tutorials on the wiki).
…and the final patch :]
alifeee - keyboard dust cover
A fairly quick keyboard dust cover using the embroidery machine, sewing machine, and overlocker. For my travel bluetooth keyboard. Wish I ironed it. The design is one of the inbuilt designs from the embroidery machine.
alifeee - GMTK gamejam
In July, there was a GMTK gamejam. I’ve participated in the gamejam four times now, including this year, with a slightly different team every year. The games we’ve made are on my video games page, or also my Itch.io page.
This year, myself and a friend made a very simple game about growing flowers :] — you can play it on PC or phone on the Itch.io page.
In total this year, there were 10.5k games made. Our game got got 20 ratings, and we ended up with a nice enough score :]
| Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
| Creativity | #1505 | 3.900 | 3.900 |
| Artwork | #2179 | 3.650 | 3.650 |
| Narrative | #4807 | 2.400 | 2.400 |
| Audio | #4916 | 2.700 | 2.700 |
| Enjoyment | #4958 | 2.850 | 2.850 |
alifeee - tiny sewing toolkit
A few years ago, I came across tinytoolk.it, a website showing off some really nice tiny toolkits.
Since then, I’ve assembled a tiny sewing kit, so I took some pictures at the hackspace and I now have an entry in the site under alifeee-sewing-kit.
alifeee - wizard costume
Last time, I talked about making a light-up orb. This was for part of a costume, and I finished it!
I was dressing up as one of these wizards from our game Penumbra
…so I also sewed together a robe out of a large grey/blue rectangular piece of fabric that I’d gotten from Scrap Dragon.
…wait until nighttime, and you have a costume! What do you reckon? Wizard-ish?
Felipe - 1970s computer and emulation drivers
I am building a 1970s computer in my kitchen 😉
More info at: https://forum.fiozera.com.br/t/historical-preservation-of-the-patinho-feio-computer-usp-1971/94
I have been studying the history and the design of this computer for years! But more recently I actually bough chips and started manufacturing PCBs to rebuild the real thing. The server rack is still pretty much empty. It is fine to show the photo, but there are other complementary images that I think are interesting to show as well, that you can find at https://forum.fiozera.com.br/t/resgate-historico-do-computador-patinho-feio-usp-1971/58
I have also been writing MAME emulation drivers for Technics musical keyboards: https://github.com/mamedev/mame/pull/15878
with a cool YouTube video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tM5xOidLLn4
jon - exotic wood pens
Got a couple of nice pieces of exotic woods so made a few stylus pens and pencils out of some thuya burr and cocobola
matthew - cat screen
Quick cat screen for the indoor cat.
matthew - snufkin
a quick painting :)
OJ and Matthew - fixing N64 power supply
We fixed Matthew’s N64 power supply. It was a blown resistor and subsequent fuse. Had to remove a whole sub board to replace resistor tho!
OJ - 3D printed ground terminal
Replaced the broken ground terminal on the bench power supply with a 3D printed one. The knurling is slightly ridiculous (made it too small) but my printer with a 0.2mm nozzle has done a really good job.
That’s all
That’s all for this month! Remember, you can:
- come and visit the space! https://www.sheffieldhackspace.org.uk/
- learn more about on joining on the wiki: https://wiki.sheffieldhackspace.org.uk/
- add your own items to next month’s month update: https://github.com/sheffieldhackspace/month-updates
Until next time :)