I have a lot of electronic parts sitting around my house, mostly as a result of several Radio Shacks closing in our area. I ended up getting a big discount on leftovers from the parts drawer(about 90% off, the first time I ever got a real deal at good ol' RS). I brought all of it home and spread it out on the floor. I knew what to do with all of the LEDs, switches, battery holders and resistors. However, I wasn't sure what to do with the capacitors. The one time I built something complicated enough to necessitate a capacitor I ended up shocking myself accidentally. So, I wasn't ready for capacitors as an electrical component, but I did think that they were pretty. Plus, they're perfectly safe if they aren't charged.



My capacitors became a crafting item and I've been using them ever since, probably the same way a magpie would. "Hmm...don't know what this is, but it's shiny. I'll just glue it to my nest."

There are a bunch of different kinds of capacitors and today's bugs are made of mylar capacitors (the square ones that that are the shape of chiclet gum), electrolytic capacitors (the drum shaped ones), and ceramic capacitors (the orange, disc shaped ones). I used those pieces to form the head/antenna, thorax/legs, and abdomen of each bug.



The legs were the trickiest part and I used a binder clip to hold the three thorax pieces together while they dried.



After that, I added a head to one end and the abdomen, always an electrolytic capacitor, to the other. After everything dried, I bent the legs to help the bug stand on its own.



I'm going to keep one on my desk for some anti-bug voodoo. Out of the three computers in the house only the one in my room is working right now. Arg.

Labels: cute, electonics, projects

posted by Alison 1/13/2009 11:23:00 PM : (0) comments : splink