Silliest DIY Project?
 

Ever make something that was so specialized, quirky, or just plain ugly that nobody else would ever want one?

I've had a few, but probably the most ridiculous was when I glued screen over the air inlets of all the power tools I used on a regular basis. I had long hair at the time and every so often it'd get sucked in and clog the motor. A hair net was a pain to bother with, and I didn't want to cut my hair, so I modified the tools.

My runner up is probably the caps I added to some sandals to make work sandals. I like my feet to breathe really well in the summer, but toe protection is a must! The caps were pieces of rubber riveted and screwed on - not attractive! I should make a new pair of those...

Work sandals sounds great! I wear sandals all year (even while shoveling snow) because my feet run really hot. I'm good at keeping my feet out of the way and it's extremely rare that I take a hit to the foot, but a little protection might be nice.

Wish I had a picture of them. They wore out a couple seasons ago.

I'm sure we could fabricate some steel toe sandals for you! I've made items by myself before. JB Weld is the best for that. I remember once a part the the vacuum cleaner had broken. It was a $60 part to order. I would have paid it for my machine at home, but since this was a beater at work I made a new part out of JB Weld. Didn't look pretty, but it is stronger than the original part.

-Jay

one thing I did recently was put a "whole house" water filter on my washing machine. the filter in the hose kept getting clogged so I decided to go for overkill.

in hind sight, I probably should have just purged the line for a while. the good thing is I will probably never have to change the filter.

not really a diy but more an item used for something other than the intended puropse.

Definitely in the spirit of what I was asking for!

I forgot one. I have to undo it and put it back to "normal" so I can sell my house more easily. I hate having to bend over with damp clothes to put them in the dryer and single unit washer/dryers were too expensive. I was planning to move the dryer's controls down by extending the wires (just spade terminals so I could make extenders without cutting them), but never got around to it since I'm tall enough to reach.https://www.fuelly.com/attachments/fo...ec83cd594b.jpg

I managed to find a video of another ugly DIY project I've since ripped out: cat ramp. I had a friend renting my loft and his cat was mean and didn't get along with mine. It was also an outdoor cat so we needed a way for it to get downstairs and outside without coming into the lower floor. Stupid cat was able to bring live animals up that thing! It was made out of scrap materials I had around so it was pretty rough. Time was short since she had a very nasty habit (I will spare you the details) if not allowed outside. I made him buy the plexiglass.

Update: I edited out all the pauses. The light was causing the cat to hesitate a lot. This makes the video jump in a few places. Shortened it by half, though.

if I didn't have a wife that would kill me, I would do that to my dryer. that is truely awesome. the advantage of the over-under without the small capacity or the extra cost.

that is great. mine are the old style washer and dryer too. mine are about 7 years old. I'd love to get the front loader style but I just can't justify spending that much when my two still work fine.

my wife also has some clothes that have to air dry so most of the time I am sorting them out anyway. if it were just me, I would build me a box this weekend for the dryer to sit on.

that is truely ingenious thinking

It needs a little reinforcing as it shakes with a big load. Just noticed all the dirt in that photo. Wonder if it's quicker to clean it and re-shoot or to photoshop it? :p

I like the dryer idea too.

I've done something similar to the cat ramp but far more ugly. My wife's idiotic dachshund has his own room with a doggy door, a small balcony, and a ramp down to a pen where he can do his business.

That cat ramp is awesome! I'd have made a compartment for the litter box down there too. It would work like those litter houses you buy that makes the litter all fall out of the cats paws before it gets onto your floor.

I can't say I have a ridiculous DIY project that nobody would want. Like the fan I used to have by the smoke detector so it wouldn't go off when making blackened fish. I just pushed a button to turn it on and again for off. It charged using the florescent light in the kitchen.

The 'dryer' setting I added to my old apartment so the ac and heat would be on for the central ac system allowing me to dry the air without getting the place cold as hell. Here in the desert we don't need that one.

The cat did its business outside (that's a cat door at the bottom). Some wild animal ate her (at least the neighbor heard it fighting something at night). She had this weird symbiotic relationship with my cat (an indoor one). She'd bring in live animals which would then find their way downstairs where my cat would catch them. I didn't figure out what was going on until birds started showing up inside.

That fan is a great idea. Very simple. Why those timed "sleep" buttons for cooking (or whatever they call them) aren't on all detectors is a mystery to me.

I thought of one more, but without pictures (it was the 90s and I had no camera). I took the guts out of a massage pad and put them into my rolling office chair at work. To keep the cord under control it went up to a couple pulleys in the drop ceiling and had a counterweight (just some fender washers held in place by some really tight cable ties). To keep your head from hitting the cord if you reclined there was a little arm off the back that curved a bit (it was a slightly bent plant hanger). Looked really good, but not a very wide appeal. I could wheel all over the place without any trouble. My boss used to joke that it was a system for zapping me if I was being unproductive. I still have all the parts for it but don't have a good place to set it up.

I have a cordless massage chair that I found clearanced at Staples or OfficeMax. It's just vibraty, not the kind with rollers/"fingers" in it.

I've got a rollers/fingers massage overlay that is made for office chairs, but its adapter supplies 12v and it works perfectly in the car.

How is it cordless? Batteries? Did they last long? A lot easier than my approach.

Yup. Charge it when you're not there, unplug it when you sit down.

took a pic of my "whole house" water filter on the washing machine.

more than anything because it looks so funny. I had fun with the camera last night.

https://i42.tinypic.com/x3v6g1.jpg

You're not messing around! Done and done!

I realized I have even more gross hack DIY projects. I really need to stop doing those.

Right now my heating system is forced hot air, provided by a home-made air handler. I used surplus truck A/C condensors and had a local place bend the housing sheet metal (my brake wasn't wide enough). Unfortunately, I used a very thin gauge, so when the fan kicks on it inflates like a balloon, causing one side to bulge out making a dimpling noise! I solved it by putting a ratchet strap around the whole thing and wedging a 2x6 under it on that side. I had planned to solve it more elegantly, but since I'm planning to sell soon the whole thing's being chucked in favor of an hydronic system, I don't need to bother.

I also made a shed designed specifically for my trailer. It's pretty narrow, so the entire front opens (there's a faux smaller door). That required a bit of structural reinforcement. For the rear and sides I used all the scrap metal roofing panels that the ones for my roof were shipped inbetween (scrap ones protected the painted ones). The ramp is a double fold design and because of the slight hill there I needed to nail on some metal lathe to give traction when my ride mower's wheels get wet (otherwise it just spins). It's about 500' from my house (near a second driveway), so there's no power and I installed a translucent roof panel to give some light.https://www.fuelly.com/attachments/fo...f335d68b99.jpghttps://www.fuelly.com/attachments/fo...3ee2abad92.jpghttps://www.fuelly.com/attachments/fo...1162d6135b.jpg

I also cooked up a DIY fan stand last summer since I had a bunch of tripods kicking around. It's not as unstable as it looks.
https://www.fuelly.com/attachments/fo...30caf27314.jpg

Other than that, I tried to use cardboard shipping boxes as heat ducts. The big sizes in metal were quite expensive, and 12x12x48 boxes were cheap. I had too much trouble joining them and was worried about resale so I abandoned the idea, but I still think it could be made to work. Finally, I use an old webcam to check the oil level in my crawlspace tank. Just have a clear tube hooked to a tee fitting coming off the tank and the camera is trained on it. To use it I plug in cord that turns it and a light on and then plug it into my TV. I tried to use pressure changes in air trapped in the tube to gauge tank level, but it seemed to vary an awful lot so I abandoned it. Plan to cook up a float based one (ten floats, ten switches, ten segment LED) later. OK, that ought to be ALL my silly projects. For now. :p

that shed looks like something from willy wonka. the whole "it looks like one thing but it's something else" kinda thing.

and your mower looks a lot like mine. a 6 or 7 year old murray from wal-mart. don't get me wrong, I love mine and when it blows up, I'll buy a new one.

The brand is "Lawn Chief", whatever that means. It was cheap. Briggs & Stratton engine so I wasn't terribly worried. I was amazed to find out how much more power it has than the first plane (16 hp vs 12). I don't need half that power, but wanted a wide mowing path so I could get the field done fast.

Yeah, looks like a Murray my parents had, the remains of which is now in my shed and I should probably just dump at the scrapyard.

I've got a Craftsman that I bought used with various annoying problems, but which all last year was smoking badly. The problem is a solenoid in the carburetor whose job is to keep gas from gravity-feeding into the engine while it's turned off. I guess once the gas overflows the carburetor, it washes down the cylinder walls, past the rings, and into the crankcase, where it mixes with the oil and overfills the oil. Once that happens and you try to run it, it spews up through the PCV and back into the engine, then gets everywhere, and coats the whole inside of the muffler with junk, so even if you change the oil and install a manual fuel shutoff you have to replace the muffler or run it for days on end to clear the smoke.

I dunno. I should have taken it to a high school shop class and left it for the winter to let some kid rebuild it. Now that spring's here, I don't know what I'm going to do.

Reel mower? :p

Oh, yeah, this wasn't strictly my silly DIY project, but I built it and made all the structural design changes (as originally conceived it'd have fallen over). A ridiculously sized computer table. And he wondered why his electric bill was over $100 a month.

I have dual screen and have seen triple screen but never 4 screens. I assume they aren't on the same computer.

the only reason you really need 3 (that I can figure) on a design basis is to see a BOM (build of materials) a schematic and a board layout at the same time.

I have always gotten along good on my 2 (they are 21 inchers though)

as far as the murray, mine is the all mighty 12.5 hp model. there again, it mowes my grass.

He had four at the high point: Macbook, shuttle PC, tower PC, and an old Amiga.

I run a single 22" one right now. Plan to upgrade to two 22" on my next system, with one turned 90 degrees. The most common use I have is reading docs while programming, so the taller size would come in handy. Of course two sideways would give more gaming possibilities.;)

I use two, but I can understand using more. With only two, I constantly have to bury and then bring forward various windows. I might be working with three maximized programs at once, plus a few cascaded windows, some monitoring that I don't touch much but want to see, and then there's IM...

I could probably use 5 screens at work (network administrator).

A virtual desktop system called Spaces on os x really helps with that. I don't know if there's a windows equivalent but I would imagine so. I remapped my numeric keypad so the buttons line up with the virtual desktop positions on the screen. Makes switching fast.

There are loads of virtual desktops for Windows, but the end result is the same for me. A basic one is published by SysInternals, and more slick ones are available elsewhere.

I wouldn't mind trying a desktop resolution larger than my monitor resolution, though -- basically virtual desktops tiled next to eachother like multiple monitors. You move your mouse past the edge of the screen and your view pans across the desktop. That used to be common in Linux but I haven't seen it in years, and I've never seen it in Windows.

Spaces lets you drag an application from one virtual desktop to the next. I actually don't like this as I sometimes do it accidentally. I prefer to go into the zoomed out show all desktops view and drag them there.

I'm actually a big believer that desktops are a bit of a boneheaded way for the majority of users to interface to their computers. It's basically just a file browser. Front and center should be something much more like the dock, but with some self-organizing ability to help less advanced users customize it (by default this should be a non-invasive suggestions approach, not an automatically change stuff on you system). Most data interaction should be done through the appropriate application, not done via a file browser. Power users may not like such a thing, but most computer owners aren't power users. I've set up Spaces to automatically launch my applications in separate virtual desktops to slightly test this sort of organization and so far I like it.

Abstract metaphores like the desktop and files are definitely a HUGE problem for common users to understand. One of the most common problems I've dealt with over the course of my career has been that people cannot grasp the concept of the file system.

There is no way that I can get my mother or my wife to understand that their files are in c:\Documents and Settings\user\My Documents\whatever.doc (or just My Documents\) (or whatever.mp3), not in Microsoft Word or iTunes. Attaching a file to an email is a HUGE event with either of them.

Not that I'm saying this is the perfect model or anything, but Front Row on the mac is much more the speed of casual users. Instead of: "OK, here's a totally general subsystem you can do almost anything with", it asks "OK, of the six things you can do, which is it?" Make a last option for "not in this list", arrange it hierarchically, and keep some frequency stats, and you're starting to get more along the lines of what I think my grandmother could handle. Well, if she hadn't been dead for more than twenty years.

I've been annoyed by moving files lately. The Finder on osx is just one window (some shortcut sort of stuff on the left, but it's not enough), so I always want a second one. I just want a file browser with two bloody windows all the time in a fixed relationship to each other. There are programs and scripts that launch two windows and put them next to each other, but you can accidentally move or close one with surprising ease. Also, that approach has some wasted space and resizing them together is a no-go.

OK, this is getting WAY WAY off topic. :) Don't even get me started on silly software DIY projects I've done. Be here forever.

There have been LOADS of simplified interfaces like that. Microsoft Bob, Windows Media Center, and GeOS (IIRC) come to mind, but I know there's way more and I see other ones all the time.

Ever see any for osx?

I'm not sure one framework would do it. Really, it's a different design philosophy for all the applications. Need an integrated approach. Maybe that's why none of them have caught on mainstream versus the desktop. Of course the desktop's had the addition of dock type devices.

Hmmm, Geos... I didn't know you were a Commodore man...

and just so everyone knows... "I adore my C-64."

-Jay

Amiga 3000 was my first Commodore. I still love it more than any computer I've owned since. So responsive!

My family spent a lot on our Commodore 64. I think we paid like $600 in 82 or 83. Then the 1541 5 1/4" floppy disk drive was another $300. It was a lot of money, but I used that machine all through middle school, high school, and partway through college. Its still fun to fire it up once in a while to play video games. I never got into Geos though, by the time Geos was released I had already been using the machine for at least 5 years. Someone gave me a hacked copy, but I thought the graphical interface was useless - but then I had been using the machine since I was about 10 or 11 and already knew how to do anything I wanted with it. Maybe if I was an adult trying to use it for the first time I would have liked it more.

-Jay

silly DIY project?

i've been contemplating a canopy for my a/c unit to give sun/heat cover. got some long 2X4s laying around unused for a possible start. any ideas?

Is it just an a/c unit, or is it a heat pump as well? When I was in high school I worked for an a/c company and I always placed the outdoor unit where it would get full midday sun whenever possible because the heat worked better when they were in the sun.

Just to clarify: that was to optimize the use of the pump for heating (vs heating and cooling)?

yes, it contains a heat pump. remember, i live in orlando, so we have many more hot days than cold. besides the heat pump uses less energy than does the a/c.

maybe an easily removeable canopy is in order!

oops! did a search for a/c canopy and look what i got...

https://www.linde-kaeltetechnik.de/up...Kuehlreg_e.pdf

I used the term "heat pump shade" and found a couple references. A lot suggesting trees or shrubs as a shading mechanism. This doesn't seem like a silly project at all, assuming the energy gains warrant it. It's mostly an aesthetic issue (maybe a few hurricane survival implications for you in FL), so I don't have any useful suggestions to give.

I have a friend who keeps talking about using water from the lake he lives on to cool his house. He'll never do it, of course. I tried using well water to cool my place (it's at 50 F here), but found I needed to use too much and got a whole house fan instead.