I’ve recently bought myself a new computer. It’s a high spec laptop, a Dell Inspiron 5580 (Inspiron 5000 series), with Intel i7 processor, SSD and 1TB hard disk, and a Nvidia graphics card. The laptop comes pre-installed with Windows but I really intend to use it running Linux. I don’t want to remove Windows completely […]

I have recently been upgrading some of my home automation. I already use Energenie Pi-Mote to control some electrical power sockets, I’ve now replaced some of my light switches with Sengled home automation light bulbs. Initially I’ve been using my Pi-power software running on a Raspberry Touch Screen and some timed actions to automatically turn […]

I was again involved with the Raspberry Pi Birthday Celebrations in Birmingham. This years event was held at the STEMHouse in Birmingham. A makerspace / startup space designed for entrepreneurs and small businesses looking to create a product. There was a strong influence of 3D printing and games programming at the event, including my own […]

In this final part of the design for a 3D printed model railway building I’ve added additional features such as the door, windows and roof as well as adding a smoke generator. These were all designed in TinkerCAD. These are designed in TinkerCAD and then exported for 3D printing. The smoke generator is fitted into […]

Megaquarium is a computer game where you get a design your own aquarium tourist attraction. It’s like Roller Coaster Tycoon, based around a Sea Life Centre. My son wants it as a Christmas present, which is great except in the days of digital downloads a bunch of binary digits doesn’t quite feel the same as […]

This year I’ve been creating a 3D model of a building for an outdoor model railway. Technically it’s a building for a weigh bridge rather than a house, but I’ve given it a Santa’s Grotto make-over for Christmas and so Christmas House sounds better. The building is designed in TinkerCAD based on a real building […]

This is a model that I’ve made using TinkerCAD. A snowman designed for 3D printing on a home 3D printer. It’s been created to approximate G-Scale (1:22.5) for outdoor model railways. It’s also hollow so that you can insert an LED inside and have it light-up (assuming it’s printed with a light coloured PLA) so […]

This is my first attempt at creating a proper scale model for 3D printing. In this case I am creating a weigh building in G-Scale. This has been a huge learning curve. I’ve since learned from some of the issues in the first model and so part 2 will improve on the techniques shown. The […]

This project is called the JLL piano. This is a school project that my daughter created for her music homework. She needed to create a project that related to Jerry Lee Lewis and she created a mini piano that plays a short clip for a different song depending upon the key that is pressed. It […]

One of the things about creating a web site is having to keep it up-to-date as changes happen. In the case of my PenguinTutor web site that is the changes in Linux and the Raspberry Pi over the last few years. In particular a new release of Raspbian was created last year (based on Debian […]