What have members of Sheffield Hackspace been up to this two-months?
Let’s find out what else some members have been up to!
- 2026 AGM
- second and third Repair Cafés !
- Adam
- Robin
- Saphy
- Richard
- Tom
- Ellie - project: Bake a Cake
- alifeee
- Jon
- Dave - the Milo Mill goes on tour
2026 AGM
In March, Sheffield Hackspace has its 12th AGM, with a cake to boot!
second and third Repair Cafés !
Since last time, two more repair cafés have run at Sheffield Hackspace. You can find out more about the repair café on: https://www.harlandworks.co.uk/repair-cafe
Here are some pictures from the 2nd and 3rd repair cafés, showing people repairing kettles & chairs, sharpening knives, and the repair of a wishing well!
Adam
hacking into bus signs
Adam has continued their sign adventures, this time adding more connectors, speeding up the refresh rate, and connecting the signs to music with MIDI !
Bus signs status update: Well. That was fast.
- Bus signs are now running on ESP32C3
- I extracted the dot-widget library for use across several projects - feel free to use it as well
- Bus signs are now running the same widget server as the train signs (with slightly different API given their nature)
- Given the construction, they are way more readable at high speeds I have replaced the MicroMaTch connector plug with an IDC one
Todo:
- Improvements to the dot-widget library animations
- Allow the driver to connect multiple lines into one display
I am now forwarding midi messages between displays.
fixing a car leak
Adam’s been investigating the engineering excellency in their car:
In today’s episode of “Why is there a swimming pool in my car?”: A gap between elements is making the water drip into the trunk. We dismantled the rear bumper plastic, cleaned up all the gunk, and are now waiting for it to dry before applying a sealant in that space. Last picture demonstrates the same place on the other side of the car, where there is no leak.
organising wire scraps with 3D printing
Started organising the 5 million wire scraps I have accumulated over the years
Robin
frame-making workshop
Over the last few weeks I instructed a few intrepid souls on a picture frame workshop, during which I attempted to walk through some of the techniques I’ve picked up.
new PPE caddy
For a while now PPE has been stored in various places around the woodshop, sometimes a bit out of sight. I delved into the scrap bin and threw together a caddy for the hearing and eye protection to hopefully make them easier to find and use.
fixing adjustment wheel
The table saw height adjustment wheel needed a replacement pin to hold it to the shaft. A bit of surgery on a nail proved to be an appropriately hack-y solution.
Saphy
medieval belt
I cut and finished a leather strap, sewed in a buckle and then added decorative riveted metal bits
helping fix a wristwatch at the repair café
I’m gluing on the baguettes that mark the hours on the face but I didn’t really do any other fixing for it, I just got summoned to manipulate the tweezers
Richard
Richard has made two YouTube videos this month(s):
Adjustable TTP223 touch sensor using an improvised capacitor.
A large touch panel using cheap TTP223 and sensing wires.
Touch-pad proof of concept. I had to make my own capacitors to reduce the sensitivity of the sensors as they were triggering each other, twinkling like a Christmas tree!
If anyone fancies implementing a touch surface on the LED table in room C, here is a starting point. I intend to experiment and develop the touch surface hardware a bit further before losing interest…
Tom
making a bag with EMF fabric
When you remember you have EMF fabric, and it’s an EMF year.
making knives
It’s knife time of year again.
telescope
Tom’s been taking exposures of the night sky, using astrophotography tricks and a custom-made astrophotography telescope, specifically this one:
Ellie - project: Bake a Cake
Ellie had a go at baking and decorating :]
Project: Bake a Cake is a resounding success I’d say 🥳
alifeee
fitting a new bike derailleur and shifter
After a few years of bumps and whatever-my-bike-goes-through, my back derailleur had started not shifting gear properly. Looking at it, it seemed to be due to a weak spring.
I took it to Sheffield Community Bike Project (SCBP) to see if they had any spare parts, and to ask them advice about changing it.
I ended up buying a 2nd hand (new to me) 7-speed derailleur and shifter (the volunteers at SCBP helped me pick one out of their 2nd hand drawers), and (again with much volunteers’ help) fitted them to my bike.
They’re doing great! SCBP’s “supported DIY” model is really nice.
trying out an embroidery machine
I recently got to try using a friends’ embroidery machine, which was very cool. I did some test designs (fills, lines, etc), and finished it off by making the robot from my favourite robot picture.
I came back a couple of weeks later to make some patches for a group hitchhiking trip (we got one each).
I followed some guidance from the University of Geneva’s Edutech wiki, on the pages ‘Embroidery Patch’ and ‘InkStitch - Embroidery Patch’.
In effect, I cut a circle of felt and stuck it to the backing with fabric glue, then used the embroidery machine to sew: a tacking stitch to stick the patch down; a satin stitch around the edge; a blobby bit; and the text. I didn’t have fancy backing, so I just carefully cut it off with scissors. I fit a few patches in each frame. You can see some of those processes here:
I was very happy with the finished patches. I ended up (in the luck-of-the-draw) getting the top left one, which is now sewn onto my backpack.
hosting a talk at Front End Sheffield
I did a talk at Front End Sheffield (FES) in March, titled “Microhacking the Modern Web”. The blurb was:
A series of short talks – to match our modern short attention spans – about modifying websites and web-technology to make them more usable and accessible by all. Topics will journey through local events websites, past Internet-of-Things-enabled weighing scales, via free company-bus schemes, around the Xbox game pass, by web-calendars, and end at $subject_to_change.
For each project, we will ask: what did the website fail to do? how did we make it better? how can other people make use of it in a non-technical way? and – what were the existing solutions? Talks will not be related through the technologies used, but through the hobby-based, DIY nature of them, and how small technologies affect the less-technical human experience. No AI has been, is, or will be, involved.
You can find the slides on my talks and workshops page.
replacing the sewing machine needle threader
I replaced the sewing machine “auto-threader”, as ours was bent beyond repair. Now it’s very easy to thread the needle. Just press, and pull!
writing blog posts
I wrote two blog posts in April, both about similar things. The first, more technical and hack-y about using your own location tracking. The second about this in action. You can read them on
trying out the new overlocker
Kindly, a hackspace member has lent their overlocker for use at the hackspace. We’ve been giving people inductions – it looks quite complicated but if you’ve used a sewing machine there are (believably) a lot of similarities. Just some complications getting all the threads in the right places.
One of my test goes with the overlocker was edging a nice tea-towel that had frayed.
fixing a broken tent
Probably the biggest thing I’ve had (or will ever have) under the sewing machine, I put a new (maybe waterproof, maybe not) hat on a broken teepee.
The purple fabric was a patch of tent-material that my neighbour gave me after seeing me in the street inspecting what the damage was.
making a trident prop
For a costume party, I made a trident. I found two large, thick, cardboard tubes at Scrap Dragon in Sheffield, and designed and 3D printed an attachment. I cut the cardboard to size, glued it with hot glue, and painted it black with acrylic paint. I was quite impressed how sturdy it was in the end :]
Jon
DIY wooden garden furniture
My latest projects - garden planter and bird table from reclaimed wood, just when the RSPB tell us not to feed the birds!
With a bit of good weather I got round to working on a couple of garden projects - both are made with reclaimed wood and materials from an old futon and some leftover decking.
PID-controlled kiln
Our old second-hand kiln had a kiln sitter which has little flexibility. With a cheap PID controller and SSR I created a controller that allows us to have several programmes with defined temperature ramps and soaks. After some initially tuning of the PID controller and tweaking some of the many potential settings the first couple of firings have worked well.
Dave - the Milo Mill goes on tour
Dave took our Milo mill for a little holiday to SMMRF:
The Millennium Machines and Desktop Machine Shop teams would like to thank Sheffield Hackspace for lending their Milo v1.5 to be displayed at SMRRF 2026. We ended up with a fantastic display showcasing all the currently available Milo versions from v1.5 to V2! As always it was a fantastic show and we would recommend it if you get a chance to go visit it next year!
That’s all
That’s all for this month! Remember, you can:
- come and visit the space! https://www.sheffieldhackspace.org.uk/calendar/
- 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 :)