Blog – Page 7

Next step: bring Frankenstein back to life

Written on March 1, 2017.

Anyone who’s watched an old Frankenstein movie – or almost any old black-and-white sci-fi movie – knows you can’t have a decent science lab without a Jacob’s ladder and its noisy, sparky electric arcs crawling up between two wires. He would get a charge out of this. Since we call ourselves ylab, member Craig felt...

Persistence brings shiny stick things to life

Written on March 1, 2017.

What-seems-like-an-eternity ago (it was the beginning of October), we kicked off a light sabre(1) big shiny stick thing making class, using a new circuit board design engineered by ylab member Richard. It’s designed to handle the latest 5V, 144 LED per meter, multi-color light strips for lowest power and maximum brightness....

Arduino open house notes + hands-on class info

Written on October 13, 2016.

We had a great group show up for the Wed Oct 12 Arduino: What’s It All About? open house. Big thanks to members Jack, Richard, Pek, Ross and Paul for bringing in and sharing their creations, and as always, to Jay for loaning his light sabres. We’re caving to popular demand and finally scheduling an Arduino hands-on class....

What’s this Arduino Stuff About? Wed Oct 12 7:30 PM @DDO

Written on October 10, 2016.

This Wednesday’s the first official, new-format Open House night. They’re now now every 2nd and 4th Wednesday of the month, and feature a presentation – this week on Arduino! Arduino night. Big thanks to Chhing Chhan for the poster. We had a trial run of the new format by making the first night of our 8-week ham radio...

Radio at Ylab: New tech, old school and quiet summer

Written on September 11, 2016.

Based on the lack of posts and updates, people say it’s been quiet the last couple of months. Over the spring and summer, we’ve received some interesting equipment donations, and they’ve been put to good use. This picture of ylab member Gilles at work in the space says it all. It’s been quiet. Sometimes, that’s a good...

New schedule! New seminars! New Open House format!

Written on September 9, 2016.

We’re changing things up for the fall! OPEN HOUSE NIGHTS: LESS IS MORE! We’ve halted our regular open house Wednesdays to make them even better. Starting October 12, we’ll have them bi-weekly, on every second Wednesday, and feature a free one-hour seminar/demo session at each one. To kick it off, we’ve scheduled a free What’s...

MAKER DAY CANCELLED

Written on August 22, 2016.

MAKER DAY CANCELLED We’ve unfortunately had to cancel the Maker Day scheduled for Sept 10. A variety of factors came in to play that just made it a little too difficult to get everything together in time to put on a quality event that all of the participants deserved. We’re putting our energy into putting on a whole bunch of smaller maker...

Future of the DDO: The View from the Basement

Written on August 10, 2016.

Warning: THIS BLOG ENTRY IS GETTING PERSONAL. No, not in the Donald Trump way. Since starting ylab and this blog, we’ve had participation, hard work and co-operation from many people and groups and companies in the community. In that spirit, we’ve kept a level of anonymity to the blog to reflect what this team effort. The anonymity was accidental...

DDO Apparitions: What the heck was THAT?

Written on July 28, 2016.

Apparitions at ylab’s home at the David Dunlap Observatory are normally of the celestial variety – like the annual Perseid Meteor Shower event, coming up on August 11. Then there’s the odd maker and project appearing at our door, but we’re not as surprised as we used to be at those. Well, most of the time. Emphasis on...

HAPPY FIRST BIRTHDAY YLAB!

Written on July 25, 2016.

Exactly one year ago today, on July 25, 2016, we held our kick-off maker event at Canada Robotix… and what a year it’s been! Our goal from the start has been to build tech community in York Region, and the community has welcomed us with open arms. Companies large and small have helped us out with loans of equipment, hosting of our events...