Classes & Events for March, 2025

Hello SnoCo Makers!We are continuing to build out our class schedule for March.

In the metal shop, Dom will be running his sold out sheet metal chassis building class again on March 15th.  We are lowering the # of spots in the class to 4 (from 6) spots this time to give everyone more hands-on time, so if you are interested, go snag a spot before it’s too late!  Jeff will be running his MIG and TIG welding classes on March 8th and March 9th respectively.  

In the woodshop, Mike will be teaching his Pen Turning class again, and we will have our Woodshop Safety & Basic Use (formally: Woodshop 101) class on March 22nd.  Finally, Chas is teaching Intro to CNC Routers on the ShapeOKO on March 29th.  This class is a prerequisite for our Avid CNC router, which we expect to be able to offer next month.

In the orange room, Terence is teaching 3D Print 102.  This course is a deep dive into printing functional parts - basically a distillation of years of 3D printing experience and thousands of dollars of filament into a 2 hour course.

And finally, in the blue room, Carolann has a “learn what  you want” event every two weeks.  As a former costume maker for the San Francisco opera, Carolann is our subject matter expert at all things sewing. 

New Classes for March

In honor of Mario (Mar 10) day, we are having a bath bomb making class on Saturday, March 15th.  We will provide all the materials and tools to make a Mario “surprise cube” style bath bomb, complete with 3D printed toys inside!  This is a great parent-child activity, but please note that this is not a drop-off event; a responsible adult must be with the children at all times.  For this particular bath bomb mold, each batch of bath bombs makes about 6-7 bath bombs - we give you the option to sign up for making 1, 2 or 3 batches.

Some of our members have expressed an interest in teaching classes - and that’s awesome.  Chas will be running a “Train the Trainer” class on Saturday, March 29th, to bring our new and interested instructors up to speed.  

We have a Podcast studio - and for those interested in learning how to use the podcast studio, Terence will be running an intro to podcasting class on March 22nd. 

We will also be running an Intro to Dye Sublimation Printing class on March 22nd as well.  Learn to print custom T-Shirts, water bottles, baseball caps, or phone cases!  Class includes materials to cover dye sublimination printing onto a water bottle, coffee mug, or 8x10" sign, so come to class with a design for something to print.  Pictured is a custom water  bottle with a screenshot taken in Minecraft.

Finally, electroforming is a method of electroplating onto non-conductive materials.  We have a copper electroforming kit in the space, and Terence will be teaching a class on electroforming 3D Prints and (real, from a tree) leaves for jewelry applications on March 29th.

Community Building Events & Membership Drive:

We've had such a great turn out for our membership drive, we are extending the drive by 15 days and hosting a weekend open house on Saturday, March 15th to commemorate the end of the membership drive and to celebrate Pi Day.  So if you know of someone that has trouble making it into the space on a Thursday night after work, and are interested in a membership, send them our way.  As a reminder, members who sign up during the membership drive is locked into the $60/month rate until the end of the year and entitled to bundle members for free.  We will allow people to make changes and updates to whom they bundle up until the end of March.

Our laser build will be on March 15th, 3-6pm.  After months of cutting, drilling, inserting T-nuts and lots of blood, sweat and tears, we are hoping to be able to drive motors around, and maybe even fire the laser for the very first time.  If necessary, we are currently holding March 16th and March 23rd for the laser build as well to try to complete the laser in March.SnoCo Maker Space is trying to have a booth at the Northwest Model Hobby Expo.  If you are interested and available the weekend of April 11th through April 13th, please let us know at snocoleadership@snocomakers.org.  We are putting together a demo of 3D printed RC construction equipment, and we will be having a build day on March 22nd.  As with any of our community building events - you do have to be an active member in good standing to attend, but no skills are required as we are always happy to train.  

Finally - can you believe that SnoCo is now 10 years old?  To celebrate, we are having a potluck on March 29th, from 12:30 to 3:30.  We are also planning on auctioning off some old equipment at our potluck.

On the horizon:

Finally, here's what’s coming on the horizon.

• We are experimenting with having our open house events on Thursday nights also be collaborative events; our wood shop is the first area where members with experience in woodworking are stepping up to help any members that have questions about their woodworking.  So, if you have a woodworking question, please feel free to swing on by on Thursday night!  

  
  
  
  

• Right now, getting the big laser is the biggest priority for one of our board members.  Once that laser is complete (or at least, operational), that will free up time to do other community building events.  For example, both the upcoming resin printer area build out and the podcast room build out will need new, custom cabinets.  We will host the cabinet build as a community build event in our newly refurbished woodshop; now that we have the Sawstop operational, we feel a lot better about bringing members that may not be as skilled in the wood shop and training them on the table saw.

  
  
  
  

• We have had an influx of new members, and we are mindful that for most people in a maker space, their experience is directly related to how often we offer classes.  Starting March 13th, we are going to have a weekly “Lightning Learning” class at our open houses - where we spend 15 minutes to show people around on our low barrier of entry tools, such as our 3D Printers.  These classes are free; just walk on in.  We will start with 3D Printers, but we will expand to laser cutters and dye sub printing and other fun things in the upstairs area of the shop.

  
  
  
  

• We have CAD and CNC classes planned and in the works for April as well as additional metal working classes.  For CAD, we will teach both OnShape and Fusion 360 - both pretty popular within the Maker Community.  For CNC, we are teaching a Fusion 360 workflow for tool path generation.  We will also be loading these software onto our design center computer(s).

As before, if you have any suggestions or requests for classes, or if you are interested in teaching any of the classes, please reach out.  You can do this one of two ways; on Discord, or via email to snocoleadership@snocomakers.org.  

In partnership,

The Board @ SnoCo Maker Space