Our June 2020 Hacker of the Month creates 3D printed BatteryBlocs – brackets used to assemble energy banks utilizing recycled batteries for sustainable off-grid energy.
For Shawn McCarty, science and experimentation have been on the forefront of all his endeavors. From working a handyman enterprise, a gardening enterprise, a house shopping for/renting enterprise, a house recording studio, and dealing within the movie business as a digital imaging technician, Shawn has achieved, and seen, all of it.
However Shawn’s present enterprise was began from a need to seek out the proper battery configuration for e-biking. With a concentrate on sustainability and self-sufficiency, Shawn used an e-bike journey across the USA as an experiment to find what limitations and servicing individuals may count on to come across when utilizing his new battery packs. However his journey began all around the world on his ‘push bike’ excursions of a number of international locations throughout a number of continents.
“On my ‘push bike’ excursions of Tanzania, Europe, Morocco, the East and West coasts, and the Canadian Maritime provinces, the motivation was as a result of I beloved journey and wished to journey. Bicycle touring was the one manner I may afford to take such lengthy journeys. It is actually low-cost and also you see so much, particularly whenever you stealth camp and cookout.”
“After lastly touring Europe on a pushbike, I could not settle for that I wanted a automobile within the states. I had my girlfriend promote my automobile whereas I used to be out biking Europe, and used the cash to journey. Once I returned to Florida I wanted to cycle locations with out arriving in a drenched sweat, and so I constructed an e-bike. I may cost it with my rooftop photovoltaics simply. I beloved it and commenced questioning about marrying e-biking and cycle touring and hatched the Loop the USA Concept. However first, I wanted a 100-mile serviceable battery! There are all the time loads of repairs to gear when journey touring, and the battery was essentially the most crucial a part of an e-bike tour.”
So Shawn got down to design a battery pack that could possibly be serviceable on lengthy highway journeys, was repairable on these journeys, and accessible by anybody that wished to cost their e-bike rapidly and simply.
“I wished to make a battery pack that I may service, take aside, and restore whereas touring. I wished to have the ability to unfold a tarp at my campsite and take aside and restore my battery. I wished to have such a battery as a result of I wished to have the ability to trip an e-bike over 100 miles in a day. However I could not discover any, so I made a decision to construct my very own!”
“After half a yr of failing ahead, and two trash baggage of prototypes, I got here up with a design and constructed an e-bike and got down to loop the USA. I wished to point out that e-bikes have been nice for longer journeys – that they weren’t simply fads or toys. I additionally wished to see if it was doable to tour with out understanding the place you will cost; to see if there are sufficient open retailers on the market to make that doable.”
So Shawn deliberate an unbelievable tour of America to check his e-bike battery pack in grand style – with the Loop the USA tour. “The Loop the USA journey – from Florida to Southern California, to Washington State to Maine, and again to Florida – was to check my repairable battery idea and to check an e-bike as a touring bike.”
Proper after starting his large USA tour, he hit his first pace bump. “The battery failed. I took it aside, found out why – electrolysis – repaired it and stored going. After 4 months and 10,000 miles I had circled the USA and arrived again at my house. I charged without cost utilizing public retailers. I camped virtually each night time. So I had loads of time to suppose and I got here up with a greater design that didn’t use dissimilar metals, the supply of my battery failures. And that design turned as we speak’s BatteryBlocs.”
BatteryBlocs allow hobbyists to assemble batteries that they will bolt collectively and restore themselves. Fabricated from ABS printed with massive nozzle sizes, the BatteryBlocs are extraordinarily sturdy and able to withstanding excessive and low temperatures. “I used to be on the lookout for a solution to make plastic instances to carry batteries. I checked out injection molding and subtractive machining, and I found 3D printing and was curious so I purchased a MakerGear M2. I used to be in love with the concept of shifting by way of design iterations in hours. I can design and 3D print an idea in a day, maintain it, take a look at it from all angles, give it some thought and take a look at and proper it, after which print the improved design tomorrow. The design pace is extremely quick and handy.”
“I believed that with sufficient 3D printers and cautious administration that manufacturing at scale was doable. The challenges appeared extra manageable than injection molding or machining with the additional advantage of huge design flexibility. As well as, I’ve numerous completely different elements in numerous configurations that I promote. It could be financially and organizationally burdensome to fabricate fifty completely different elements with fifty completely different molds, to order sufficient of them and hope they promote whereas storing them someplace. It’s so a lot simpler to fabricate on-demand, so I preserve a small stock of pre-made elements, normally sufficient to fill small orders. I pull from these and concurrently print substitute stock. It’s fairly near manufacturing on-demand.”
Presently, Shawn employs a number of MakerGear 3D printers, Creality CR-10s, and a LulzBot Workhorse for manufacturing of his elements. He additionally presently makes use of Matterhackers ABS after experiencing the sensitivity of PLA with temperature post-printing. “I used to be noticing that older BatteryBlocs have been turning into brittle. Then a buyer advised me that he had left a battery product of BatteryBlocs within the sprint of his automobile in Texas, and when he returned the plastic had deformed. I wanted to alter plastics. ABS and the Lulzbot Workhorse with the 1.2mm nozzle enable me to create robust prints extremely rapidly.”
Whereas he runs a profitable enterprise utilizing 3D printing, Shawn sees room for enchancment in 3D printing. “I wish to see machines which can be designed for manufacturing. They might take away the elements from the mattress robotically and return to printing. I’d love to inform my printer the variety of elements that I need, the varieties of elements I need, and return within the morning and discover sixty-three of them in a bin and my 3D printer shut off.”
“As well as, 3D printers are nonetheless actually fidgety, finicky machines. All that I’ve used not less than. Like pets, you get to know the quirks of every of your machines. They have to develop into extra like an ink printer, I by no means fidget with these.”
Along with the BatteryBlocs Shawn produces, he additionally designs and 3D prints different gadgets like Powerwall Caps and Fencepost tube batteries, which might be coming to his web site quickly.
If you need to be taught extra about Shawn and BatteryBlocs, please go to his web site right here:
You can too see movies of Shawn’s earlier tour bike adventures, in addition to educational movies on BatteryBlocs right here:
