Monthly Archives: March 2022

Week 7: Light Switch Part 2

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This week, we finished up our light switches. First, I decorated the iPad switch. I drew a box for the screen, and then I drew a bunch of apps and colored them different colors. Then, since I was done and there was still time, I quickly made another button for my iPad, that is also a light switch. The button that I added is an “Off” button. I made it the same way as the home button. I attached a piece of tinfoil at the top right of the iPad. Then I cut a small piece of a rubber band, and hot glued each side an inch apart to the cardboard. I cut out and colored a small cardboard circle, to the middle of the rubber band. Lastly, I hot glued a small piece of tinfoil to the bottom of the circle.

I finished early, so I decided to test out my light switches. They all worked, but I had to make an adjustment to the Starbucks cup and the lever. I couldn’t stick the alligator clip inside of the cup to the bottom, where the tinfoil is. So I cut a hole through the bottom of the cup. Then I tested them a couple more times, made little adjustments, and I was done. The next day, it was time to play the light switch game. One person starts the timer, and one person flips over 2 cards. If one of the cards is red and one is black, the third person hits the light switch that is on the side of the red card. If the cards are both red, the third person hits the middle light switch. If both of the cards are black, the third person doesn’t do anything. Once they get through the whole deck of cards, the person who is timing it stops the timer. The goal is to get through the whole deck as fast as you can. My record time was 35 seconds. From this project, I learned how to make a light switch with only a few materials. 

Week 6: Light Switch

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This week, we learned a little bit about how light switches work. To make a light switch, you need at least 1 battery, some wires, and a light bulb. The more batteries you have, the more light it will produce. So our assignment is to make 3 different creative light switches. For the switch to work, you have to have tinfoil not touching tinfoil in the beginning, and then you push or pull something, and tinfoil touches tinfoil.

First, I drew some sketches. For my first sketch, I designed a Starbucks coffee cup. When I was done, I got started building. The cup is made out of cardboard that I curved, and closed with another piece of cardboard at the bottom. I put a piece of tinfoil at the inside-bottom of the cup. Then I got a straw, and hot glued a piece of tinfoil to the bottom, as well as the middle of a cut rubber band. I glued one end of the rubber band to one side/top of the cup, and the other end to the other side/top of the cup. Here’s how it works – you attach one alligator clip to the straw tinfoil and another alligator clip to the cup tinfoil. You push the straw down, and the tinfoil on the straw, touches the tinfoil on the bottom of the cup, and the light switch lights up.

Then, I drew another sketch. I decided to do a lever/scale. I cut out a base for the lever out of cardboard. Next I cut out a triangle, so that the lever can move up and down/ side to side. Then I cut out a long oval for the lever. I hot glued some Pom poms for decoration. I taped the middle of the lever to the top of the triangle. Then, I hot glued one piece of tinfoil to one side of the lever, and another piece of tinfoil to the base of the lever, so that when you push down on the lever, the tinfoil on the lever touches the tinfoil on the base.

Lastly, I drew a sketch of an iPad. The home button has a piece of tinfoil on the bottom, and the iPad has another piece of tinfoil on it. I taped each end of a cut rubber band to the iPad, and taped the home button to that. So when you push the home button down, the tinfoil on the home button touches the tinfoil on the iPad. Next week I will decorate the iPad.

Week 5: Jewelry Part 2

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This week, we worked on the bespoke jewelry again. Bespoke means customized jewelry for someone else. On Monday, we put double sided tape on top of the burger drawing, and stuck the wire frame to the tape. This makes it like a stencil, so it is easier to create an accurate burger out of wire. On Tuesday, I started working on the burger. It was really challenging. First I cut off two small pieces of wire for the pieces that connect the burger to the frame. I stuck those to the tape, over the stencil. 

Then, I started shaping the bun. I used the round nose plier to make a soft bend for the top of the bun. Then, I brought the wire around to make the bottom line of the bun. This part was really hard. I also had to make it match up with the stencil. I curved the corners of the bun, and stuck it to the tape, making sure it matches up with the stencil. 

Next, I worked on the lettuce. I decided to make a wire with a bunch of curves. I used the round nose pliers for this. It wa’s hard to get the wire to look curvy like lettuce. But, I finally got it. Then I worked on the burger. This wasn’t so hard. I made a rectangle with rounded corners and stuck it to the tape. The last part was the bottom bun. I had to make it fit into the stencil, and look like a bun. I was so happy when I finished. Sadly, I never got time to Solder it. But, I learned how. You get some solder on the soldering iron, and then you put flux on the shaped wire to get some of the dirt and oil off of it. Next, you put a tiny bit of solder on the joints of the wire, to connect them. You do that for all of the joints. And then you are done. I will do this next week.

Here is how it looks so far:

Tech Week 4: Jewelry Making

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This week, we started working on making jewelry for a person of our choice. I chose to make it for my camp friend. We had to make an interview for the person we are making the jewelry for to try to get an idea of what to make. I used the information I learned from my friend to draw a bunch of different possible designs. I drew a burger because that is an inside joke, some of her favorite brand logos, an ice cream cone because she loves ice cream, our camp logo, a TikTok logo because she loves TikTok, a microphone because she loves singing, her initials, her name, her first initial, a volleyball because she loves volleyball, and more. My 2 top choices were the brand (aviator nation) logo or a burger. I counted the number of wires it would take to make the aviator nation logo, and it was more than 6. Our max number of wires we are allowed to make is 6. Then I counted the number of wires in the burger design, and it was exactly 6. So I chose the burger.

Next, we started making the border for the jewelry charm. It was very confusing, but I managed to do it. The materials that I used were a mandrel, round nose pliers, chain nose pliers, wire cutters, safety goggles, and wire. I shaped my wire by putting it around the mandrel. I then had to bend a wire, make a loop with the other one using the round nose pliers and cut the extra wire off. Next, I made a coil around the neck of the loop by wrapping the wire around it a few times. The bracelet will go through the loop. The charm part is an open circle. I am super excited to finish this project next week!