How to Colonize
an Asteroid
How to Colonize
an Asteroid
There is nothing fancy here - I cut all of my wooden parts from various scraps of wood which I had laying about the garage. Your parts may look a little different, depending on what you find in your garage. Note that you are free (and encouraged) to change this design depending on what scraps of wood you have available, but that the goal is to construct a solid base which will hold the jars centered under the electrode support.
Start by lining up your 5 baby food jars on a piece of 2 X 4 to get the length of the base. Measure and cut the board so that it is a quarter to a half inch longer than the line of jars. You want all of the jars to fit comfortably, with a small amount of space between them. Mine actually worked out to exactly 12 inches long.
You will need two centering rails to help hold the jars in place. I used a section of quarter round moulding. You can use just about whatever small stock you can find. Cut the centering rails to the same length as the 2 X 4 base.
The electrode support should be about an inch longer than the base to allow for overhang outside the end supports. Mine is made from a section of firring strip - 1.4" wide, half an inch thick, and 13" long. Once again - improvise!
The end supports are the only wooden parts which might be a bit difficult to cut. These end supports will eventually get nailed to the ends of the 2 X 4 base, and will be used to hold the electrode support over the jars (note the notch in the top of each end support).
You will have to create your own plans for the end supports, depending on what you find for materials. Different types and brands of jar are of different sizes, and your electrode support will probably be different than mine. Measure the width to fit your base - a standard 2 X 4 in the US is only three and a half inches wide (which is fine for this project) - check yours to be sure. To get the height, set your tallest babyfood jar on the base and measure about one quarter inch above the top of the jar - this will be the location of the bottom of the notch for the electrode support. Add to this measurement the width of your electrode support to get the overall height of the end support. Mine came out to be five and three quarters inches. Measure and draw a line in the center of the support, and draw a notch to fit your electrode support. Cut the notch by cutting the long edges with a saw, just down to the line at the base of the notch, then use a small chisel to cut the short section away. IT DOES NOT HAVE TO BE PERFECT! (It just has to work!)
© 1999, Robert Lyon Richards