Fire from… water

DIY water torch electrolyzer for soldering metal

Anyone who reads the description of the electrolyzer I developed will be convinced that a few liters of water are enough to obtain a high-temperature flame (200° C). The high flame temperature makes it possible to solder ferrous and non-ferrous metals with practically any refractory solders, or with the metal itself (welding). The high concentration Read more…

Three-tier sauna heater

DIY sauna stove heater: three-block welded steel design

Having decided to build a sauna on my country plot, I read a fair amount of relevant literature. Not everything in the proposed stove designs appealed to me. I wanted to simplify the construction, make it more practical from a manufacturing standpoint, and at the same time improve its operational qualities. As a result, I Read more…

Fruit guillotine

Homemade guillotine secateur for slicing apples

Tasty, fragrant apples and pears. And they are not lacking in vitamins. But keeping these fruits until the next harvest is a problem — and sometimes a serious one. Drying, pickling and jam-making, and other methods of preserving come to the rescue. Moreover, according to gourmets, the value of products prepared for storage increases noticeably Read more…

Tracer potato planter

DIY potato tracer and planter made from pipes

Potatoes are often called the second bread, emphasizing the extraordinary importance of this crop. Yet in terms of labor intensity, especially on individual plots, it is far from last on the list. All the more so if all the work is done here the old-fashioned way, without any means of mechanization. A device I designed Read more…

Half a meter of health

Sports corner for a small one-room apartment

Undoubtedly, a home sports complex is necessary for any family, especially a young one. But what if you live in a small one-room apartment or, like my family, in a dormitory room? Under such conditions, when you cannot even install a basic pull-up bar in a doorway, talking about a full gym is simply unrealistic. Read more…

Build-it-yourself chair

Knock-down plywood chair with interlocking grooves

When making furniture at home, the main problem always arises for the amateur craftsman: how to join the individual parts, what fastening to choose so that it is simple but reliable. Everything is used: from simple nails and screws to mortise-and-tenon and complex glued joints, bolt fastenings, metal parts, and shaped profiles — depending on Read more…

Ping-pong on the lawn

DIY folding table tennis table for yard and garden

Homemade table tennis tables in a yard are usually made stationary: crude ones, from boards or even from concrete slabs — such structures can be called a table only conditionally. And they are not protected from precipitation, constantly remaining in the open air. Imported folding tables have now appeared on sale; they “break” in the Read more…

Got a hole? We’ll fix it!

How to repair a windsurf board hole: step-by-step patch

One cannot help but admire the swift glide of a windsurfer catching the wind across the water, or the no less dizzying descent down a cresting ocean wave on another board resembling a wide ski. Both of these sports craft, under a fairly thin outer shell, have a fairly soft foam filling, so damaging such Read more…

Garden “barber”

EKU-1 electric trimmer: versatile garden tool

Today we present a universal electric trimmer for mowing grass on lawns and shaping shrubs. I once worked as a mechanic on garden and park machines, or simply gasoline lawn mowers. I often had to cut grass and shrubs in awkward places and on limited areas. Existing scythes and large hand shears were poorly suited Read more…