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Let me tell you about me Gear Fabrication Syndrome

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Re: Let me tell you about me Gear Fabrication Syndrome

#111

Post by jcpst »

wodenokoto wrote: post #8

> Gear Acquisition Syndrome (GAS). A person’s insatiable urge to buy equipment for their art or hobby, distracting them from actually practicing said art or hobby. > It’s driven in part by the belief that new gear will improve one’s art or performance, e.g. I don’t sound like Jimi Hendrix because I don’t have the same effects pedal he used. Bit tangent, but I think one should just embrace it and say “my hobby is coll…

GAS is often a side-effect of developing certain hobbies in a consumer-centric environment.

I feel like myself and my friends are aware of this.

GAS is the syndrome, and we talk about it to help keep ourselves in check and not lose sight of what we’re actually doing.

Re: Let me tell you about me Gear Fabrication Syndrome

#112

Post by MSFT_Edging »

Paul-Craft wrote: post #38
interroboink wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I like this take. Nobody thinks of stamp collecting as a problematic hobby. Collecting and curating is fun in its own right. Though I do think there can be another aspect at play; I often find myself collecting things that I think "might be useful". Eg: I have a ton of empty yogurt containers, for use in hypothetical future art projects. I do use them sometimes, but at this point I have plenty. I still feel the urge…

Accumulating stuff that "might be useful" at some indefinite point in the future, without trying to curate the accumulation might not be hoarding, but, it's actually quite similar to the mindset of some of the actual hoarders on the TV show Hoarders. Those people obviously take it to pathological extremes, and I'm not suggesting having a bunch of empty, cleaned out yogurt containers stashed away somewhere is in any w…

> Accumulating stuff that "might be useful" at some indefinite point in the future, without trying to curate the accumulation might not be hoarding, but, it's actually quite similar to the mindset of some of the actual hoarders

Every once and a while I'll try to curate my parts bin, tossing bulky or unused items that I haven't needed.

Every time I find myself needing some seemingly dumb part from what I got rid of a month or two later.

I still try to clean up, fully knowing I'll need that thing later. Its rough.

Re: Let me tell you about me Gear Fabrication Syndrome

#113

Post by quickthrower2 »

breckenedge wrote: post #92
quickthrower2 wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am the other way. I like others to make good frameworks and I like building the customer facing thing.

Have you worked with eager designers who love to reinvent everything?

Luckily no

Re: Let me tell you about me Gear Fabrication Syndrome

#114

Post by LastTrain »

Brian_K_White wrote: post #16

All that design and fabrication work, and the pedals swing the wrong way? And has no rigid frame connection to a seat? If you're going to bother, then one of the biggest things is to rigidly attach the pedals to the seat so that they cannot move in relation to the seat even against the full power of legs. And of course car pedals swing on a pivot that is above the pedals not below, although the gas pedal has an extra…

Ever heard of a Volkswagen Beetle, or a Porsche 911?

Re: Let me tell you about me Gear Fabrication Syndrome

#115

Post by yayitswei »

Fluorescence wrote: post #26
interroboink wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I like this take. Nobody thinks of stamp collecting as a problematic hobby. Collecting and curating is fun in its own right. Though I do think there can be another aspect at play; I often find myself collecting things that I think "might be useful". Eg: I have a ton of empty yogurt containers, for use in hypothetical future art projects. I do use them sometimes, but at this point I have plenty. I still feel the urge…

I am a bit disturbed by collecting hobbies to be honest. When there is some novelty, archival or scientific value to a collection, that is different and fascinating, it's the purely consumerist collecting that gives me the heebie-jeebies. It's purely acquisitive and about the buying and getting and just seems quite sad and empty. Those afflicted become slaves to the companies pumping out items purely for this class o…

Isn't that the highest level of Maslow's hierarchy? Where your other needs are met so you can afford to do something "useless" that makes you happy.

Re: Let me tell you about me Gear Fabrication Syndrome

#116

Post by JakeTehPwner »

bluescrn wrote: post #64
Zondartul wrote: post #55

A 3D printing hobby is basically GAS/GFS-as-a-hobby. You buy the cheapest printer, then print better parts for it, then you buy a second printer to print faster and with more quality, then you go on an ebay spree and buy a VORON kit to make your own, then you build a "mostly-printed CNC", lathe, plotter, laser cutter, and then you run out of room in your garage and start looking for a bigger house. It's a huge money…

Buy a Prusa, Skip most of the setup/tweaking/upgrading. Print things. Learn to design things to print.

I just bought the prusa mk4 kit+enclosure, spent 20+ hours building it, and now I can’t stop printing upgrades for it(mostly the enclosure). I sealed the enclosure a bit, did the squash ball feet mod for the printer(it’s silent now), and I’m currently printing this: https://www.printables.com/model/588524-prusa-mk4-improved-f...

Re: Let me tell you about me Gear Fabrication Syndrome

#117

Post by bluGill »

Everyone needs to have a list for for their hobby of useful things they will buy if cheap enough, and a budget to spend one it. Then when a deal comes they will know if they buy or not. Of course some people think nothing of dropping $150,000 on their hobby, while others only have $5 to spend. The important part is it keeps you from filling up space with good deals on things that don't actually apply or you already have one of (unless your hobby benefits from more than one)

Re: Let me tell you about me Gear Fabrication Syndrome

#118

Post by xtiansimon »

GFS could lead to a better appreciation of the quality of consumer goods.

I think you can compare most collections to fashion. Some people collect based on color or fabric. Others on quality of manufacture. Or on quality of fit. Then we have brands and finally pure hysteria—something you won’t wear, but only desire to own.

This explains keb collectors and someone who owns Jimi’s actual fx pedal. The DIYer could just be an aficionado of manufacture or perfect fit.

My2c

Re: Let me tell you about me Gear Fabrication Syndrome

#119

Post by mikewarot »

When I was younger, I used to participate in the local radio club's "foxhunts" on 2 meters. Every month I'd be trying out some new cobbled together antenna, or home made doppler gear. It was a lot of fun. I never did settle on an optimum setup. The joy of just trying things out was the reward.

---

As for actual gear fabrication, I used to make gears, mostly bevel gears, but also some spur and helical gears, as well as gear like objects. Since bouncing out of the field (due to long covid) it is only lack of budget that has kept me from trying to build/acquire gear to be able to make gears myself at home. I really want a pocketNC.

I'm convinced I could find a way to Power Skiving[1] straight bevel gears, which should be impossible(because the pitch of the gear teeth varies continuously across the distance from the central axis), with sufficient budget and time.

It's fun to tinker, and that's the reward in itself.

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EefFxEGVbWo

Re: Let me tell you about me Gear Fabrication Syndrome

#120

Post by kaashif »

Paul-Craft wrote: post #54
Fluorescence wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am a bit disturbed by collecting hobbies to be honest. When there is some novelty, archival or scientific value to a collection, that is different and fascinating, it's the purely consumerist collecting that gives me the heebie-jeebies. It's purely acquisitive and about the buying and getting and just seems quite sad and empty. Those afflicted become slaves to the companies pumping out items purely for this class o…

I wouldn't go so far as saying it give me "heebie-jeebies," but I also don't see the point in collecting mass market consumer items that are not and have never been rare. Probably the closest I come to ever wanting to do so is that I have a real appreciation for old computer systems. Once, I even got it in my head that I could theoretically own and run a working PDP-11. Fortunately/unfortunately, I've never had the s…

I used to collect old Sun, IBM, and HP Unix workstations. You know, the ones with weird architectures like SPARC, POWER, and PA-RISC. And the software to run on them, which was often very weird.

Like you, this isn't the mass market consumerism type of collecting, but is maybe a bit closer to it than your idea of somehow getting a working PDP-11.

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