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Ask HN: What's the coolest physical thing you've made?

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Re: Ask HN: What's the coolest physical thing you've made?

#51
I bought a house that was sold as "uninhabitable" in Amsterdam, pulled out all the interior walls, applied insulation, then taught my self plumbing and did the plumbing, redid the wiring, installed the gas heater, laid radiant heating. I built new interior walls and did all the interior finishing except for plastering downstairs and pouring cement over the radiant heating, which I had professionals do. Coolest single thing I built in the house is probably the kitchen peninsula which I somehow aced the oak waterfall on (thanks to Festool I guess).

Sounds kind of cool listed out like that but it was a shit ton of work, it's still not fully done and as I was an absolute beginner with limited time a lot of things are half-assed or have to be redone at some point. I quit my job shortly after buying the house (for unrelated reasons) and took a year long sabbatical but it still wasn't long enough enough time. People warning you about renovations like this should be taken seriously.

If instead of buying this house cheap and doing this renovation, I probably could've just taken a job at a bank or some big tech co in Amsterdam and afforded the same or even nicer a year or two later. Though, with the housing market being as it is the timing was super favourable for me financially. It's also kind of neat to live in a turn of the century house with all sorts of modern amenities like radiant heating, thick insulation and HRE balanced ventilation.

Re: Ask HN: What's the coolest physical thing you've made?

#53
My dining table. It's a trestle design, made from walnut, breadboard ends, wedged and drawbored tenon joinery for the base assembly, and large enough to fit 10-12 people around for Thanksgiving. The lumber cost $1,400 and it took over a month to build, but it really transformed our dining room.

Some day, I look forward to building a guitar and a telescope, either of which have the potential to take that title away from my dining table, but that will be several years down the road for me.

Re: Ask HN: What's the coolest physical thing you've made?

#54
* modular synth - not pre-build modules, but from circuit schematics (yusynth) upwards: https://photos.app.goo.gl/WemnJZp1ecTxksjb6

* 2-axis camera gimbal - my first fully 3d-printed design. I will try to use this for astrophotograhy target tracking when the weather permits but I haven't been able to actually field test this yet: https://photos.app.goo.gl/a7VxYy77NaH48XP56

Re: Ask HN: What's the coolest physical thing you've made?

#55
post #51

I bought a house that was sold as "uninhabitable" in Amsterdam, pulled out all the interior walls, applied insulation, then taught my self plumbing and did the plumbing, redid the wiring, installed the gas heater, laid radiant heating. I built new interior walls and did all the interior finishing except for plastering downstairs and pouring cement over the radiant heating, which I had professionals do. Coolest single…

If I was an absolute beginner (which I am) I would be definitely very wary to do by myself the electrical wiring or the gas connections... while half-assing the rest can only look bad, those can kill you and your loved ones (neighbors need not apply).

Re: Ask HN: What's the coolest physical thing you've made?

#58

Does a garden count? In a small, urban plot I grow grapes, tomatoes, strawberries, mint, elderberries, and carrots. A work in progress but I'm building a modular synthesizer. I've built the power supply and have the VCO started on a strip board. Planning on adding some bits to that, making a step sequencer, and some filters.

> Does a garden count?

Yes, absolutely! :)

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