Another month and another very long list of life events that need to be accounted for.
First and foremost, the most amazing thing happened to my wife and I on October 22nd. We became a parents to the cutest little baby boy around! As you might have guessed, a very large portion of my time has now been devoted to this little guy, putting modding and design on the back burner to him and my real job. Though I’m still ever persistent to get at least an hour or two of work done a day on my projects, it’s still quite the taxing endeavor sometimes. He’s actually sleeping right behind me down in my office as I write this. Sleep is hard to come by but when he konks out, I have a limited window to get stuff done which is why I’m posting now!
Evan Christopher Downing
That was the big news.
The second big news is certainly modding related in that I am also a proud new owner of a FlashForge Dreamer 3D Printer which I just acquired a week ago. This completes the main trifecta of my work shop as I now have a full CAD, 3D Printing and CNC Milling capabilities in house. This is already helping out greatly in a boat load of projects I’ve been working on and I’ve been working out the kinks to get full sized, quality prints from my new machine which I can then incorporate to the milling machine to make up for the short falls of 3D printing quality and the tolerances that have to be compensated for because of the precision of my CAD programs.
As far as the 3D printer itself goes, I’ve done a (long) unboxing video to show what one from the US might expect to find inside their package. Overall I’m happy with the machine so far, aside from some of it’s corner cutting when it comes to material and exterior construction, but hey it’s been printing reliably enough for the price and a lot of the failures I’ve had are just the early learning curve. Check out the video below if you’re so inclined to do so!
The FlashForge Dreamer 3D Printer
So what have I been up to these past few months? Well it’s been kind of a secret but lets just say that I’m working on trying to redefine what one could call a “hack” as far as making a portable gaming console goes. In an attempt to try and push the boundaries between what has been a traditional portable system to what I feel can be achieved, I’m getting closer to making this a physical demonstration. Since July I’ve been working on the design of a new portable project. This one is going to go where no portable has gone before and employ methods which combine all three of my in house processes along with custom PCBs and help from my good friend RDC.
A test print of the front face bracket of my new project.
With all that said, the next couple of months are going to be quite fun to see where they lead. I’m pretty excited about where things are right now and there will be more updates in the near future!
Downing's Basement 