In my experiences working on electric vehicles, and other wacky projects I never thought possible, I’m sure I would never have done any of it without a little help from my friends.
Having support, and extra set of hands, and some advice from someone more experienced can make a huge difference. I sometimes hear people say to me
“I’d love to build an electric car, but I:
- Live in an apartment
- Don’t have the space
- Don’t have the right tools
- Have never done this before
- etc.
Those cases are where it would be nice to have a little clean, dry workspace, with the appropriate tools and support. Enter the Makerspace. Also known as a Hackerspace, and running under many other names, a Makerspace is a physical workshop/classroom/project space, shared tools, and collective of individuals with the shared goal of “making stuff”.
Projects range from electronics and robotics, to computer hacking, to machining and metalwork, to fine woodworking, to electric cars.
In my area, we had an informal group the sprung up from both electric car construction and from a robotics club. Eventually both of these outgrew the one guy’s garage, becoming the Milwaukee Makerspace.
Want to know more about the Makerspace? Well, several of the members are pretty good with video, and made a nice little film about it.
If you happen to be in the greater Milwaukee, Wisconsin, United States area, please stop by the GRAND OPENING party April 9,2011. We’ll have a couple of home-made EVs there for you.
