Thomas Tilley
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What can't you do with PVC (Polyvinyl Chloride) pipe? The ubiquitous blue PVC water pipe can be seen along most streets here and appears to be one of Thailand's most abundant un-natural resources. A wide variety of different connectors are available and apart from carrying water it is also used as a cheap construction material that can be used to make everything from clothes dryers to Wheel chairs (PDF), Crutches, flagpoles and shop signs.
Of course on the Internet you can also find some other very cool and creative things made from (non-blue) PVC pipe including: Halloween costumes like Ben Hallert's Matrix APU and Aliens Exo-skeleton Power Loader, another power loader costume, single and multi-guitar Guitar Hero stands, a laptop stand, flutes, and even a shaving stand.
Below you will find, in chronological order, some of my own (mostly original) creations made from PVC water pipe including:
This was the project that started my love affair with blue PVC pipe. I had seen the blueprints for this marshmallow shooter while I was in Australia but the fittings were prohibitively expensive (see the image right). Fortunately they are very affordable here in Thailand. The shooter is constructed from approximately 60cm (2') of 13.5mm (1/2") pipe, 2 x T-pieces, 2 x elbows, 2 x end caps.
 Source: HOWTOONS |
Fortunately in Thailand there is a drink called "cha muk" or "pearl milk tea" - I think it's known as bubble tea in other countries. Cha muk comes in a variety of flavours, it's served with a straw that is about 1cm in diameter, and it contains black tapioca balls (pearls).
Invariably when you get to the end of your drink
you have a supply of pearls left over and my son and I discovered that
the straws make wonderful pearl shooters. Using the same blow-gun
principle as the marshmallow shooter, you can shoot tapioca pearls at
each other and there's no denying a hit because they stick in a way
that would make you think they were made from velcro. Not only is
this useful as evidence but you can also pull them off and use them to
re-load in the midst of battle!
This is perhaps the most obvious use for PVC water pipe - plumbing! When you rent a house in Thailand, often it doesn't even come with the kitchen sink. When we moved in my wife decided where she wanted the sink to go and armed with my new found PVC pipe skills that I acquired making the marshmallow shooter I plumbed water to the tap.
I was a little reluctant to go smacking holes in the wall to find a drainage pipe so for a number of months we kept a bucket under the sink. My father had no such qualms, however, and when they came to visit he plumbed the drainage for us.
I made a matching pair of these indoor soccer goals for my son using some 13.5mm (1/2") pipe, 2 x T-Pieces and 6 x elbows.
Cricket (not to be confused with Brockian Ultra-Cricket) is Australia's national sport played with a bat, a ball, and two wickets. This is a PVC wicket I made for Australia Day 2007 using some 25mm (1") pipe, 6 x T-pieces, and 2 x elbows. Some people would consider using a wicket like this to be cheating because the bails (two horizontal pieces that balance on top of the three upright stumps) are glued on!
Continuing with the sports theme, this is a basketball hoop I made so that my son could practise Basketball. I found some dimensions on the Internet and made the ring using 13.5mm (1/2") pipe, 6 x T-pieces, and 12 x 45-degree elbows. The backboard is a non-regulation size piece of plywood that we found lying around and we used green duct tape for the markings.
Although the ring isn't strong enough to hang off, the side supports make it robust enough for normal play. They also give it a very Star Trek feel and I think the ring looks not unlike the NCC-31911 Saratoga.
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 Source: ShipSchematics |
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This is perhaps the most straight forward use for PVC pipe on this page. I made some shelf supports for the Computer Science section of our home library using some 20mm (3/4") pipe, 0 x T-pieces, 0 x elbows, and 0 x end caps.
There is an "Easter egg" in the full-size image - one of our marshmallow shooters can be seen on the top shelf.
I've always been a fan of the movie Tron and this is a controller I made out of PVC pipe to play the lightcycle racing game GL-Tron. The controller is made from 3 sections of 13.5mm (1/2") pipe, 2 x 25mm to 13.5mm (1" to 1/2") reducers, 2 x custom motorbike hand-grips, 4 x push-buttons, and a mercury switch which are connected to a computer via a hacked USB joystick.
You can find more details about how I made the controller on this project page and I've also extended the same idea to play GL-Tron using real motorbikes.
A university student who played with the PVC Water Pipe Tron Controller, described above, said "That's OK but I like to play driving games". It got me thinking and over the next week I spent my evenings building a PVC racing car controller - essentially a wheel-less, PVC go-kart frame connected to the computer via a hacked USB joystick.
Some Thai university students who saw the first car wanted to know how it all worked and six of them came around one Saturday and we spent the whole day hacking joysticks and building a second car. By connecting them both to a laptop and a data projector we were able to play split-screen Daytona USA.
The white office table I used for the virtual pinball machine wasn't high enough to be played comfortably. Originally, I used some bricks to raise the table the more pinball-like height of 90cm (35") but then I decided that some PVC leg extensions would be somewhat more portable.
Extensions for each end of the table were constructed using 13.5mm (1/2") pipe, 2 x T-Pieces, 2 x end caps, 2 x 40mm to 13.5mm (1 & 1/2" to 1/2") reducers and 2 x short lengths of 40mm (1 & 1/2") pipe. The horizontal bars aren't glued so the extensions can be fitted to tables with different dimensions by simply cutting some more 13.5mm pipe to the appropriate length.
If you look carefully you can see the legs in action around the 37 second mark in video:
Both the virtual pinball table and the Plasma Pong table require vertically mounted data projectors. The virtual pinball table has made appearances at six different venues and as a result I now have a growing collection of PVC cages used to suspend a number of different projectors beneath stairs, air-conditioners and various ceilings.
Data projectors are expensive and nothing dampens a good game of pinball more than a data projector unexpectedly crashing on to the table (especially if it's not yours!). Make sure everything is glued securely and use liberal amounts of duct tape and cable-ties for backup. Be careful not to obstruct air inlets/outlets and if you are borrowing a friends projector make sure you let them know what you intend doing with it first!
As straightforward as this stand looks, the "L"-shaped upright section is actually part of an air-conditioner mount for a data projector that I made for one of the virtual pinball table installations. The T-piece isn't glued and so in a small way (a very, very small way) I like to think that if the air-conditioning mount were ever needed again then the parts could re-combine in a Voltron or Captain Planet and the Planeteers or Power Rangers MegaZord-like way. Of course if that happened my laptop screen would fall down.
I don't own a Nintendo Wii but I did manage to get my hands on a Wiimote so that I could try out some of Johnny Chung Lee's cool projects. This is a Wiimote mount I built using a length of 35mm (1 and 1/4") pipe, some 13.5mm (1/2") pipe, 3 x T-pieces, and 4 x elbows.
The 35mm pipe has been cut so that it fits nicely into the
ridges down the side of the Wiimote which holds it securely. This is
screwed onto a T-Piece which has also had its top cut off. The joint
between the two topmost elbows is not glued so the angle of the top
section can be adjusted.
This is yet another DIY Wii Zapper that I built using some 35mm (1 and 1/4") pipe, some acrylic, a cable tie, and a broken hot-melt glue-gun. While perhaps not as cool as a cereal box, Lego, MP5, or AK47 Wii Zapper, it gets the job done.
The original trigger mechanism in the broken hot-melt glue-gun is designed to feed glue forward but I needed a mechanism that would pull back on the "B" button underneath the Wiimote. I cut the handle off of the old glue-gun and made a custom red acrylic trigger that used the original pivot point and had a slot in the top for a cable tie.
The cable tie feeds through a slot in the bottom of the 35mm pipe which has been cut in the same manner as the Wiimote Holder described above. The cable tie lies beneath the Wiimote and when the trigger is squeezed it pulls back on the "B" button. Two small pieces of PVC glued at the back of the pipe stop the Wiimote from sliding backwards and a another small piece glued beneath the "B" button keeps the cable tie at the correct height. A second (working) glue-gun was used to glue the handle to the bottom of the pipe.
It's not as cool
as this
PVC workbench but my workbench is made from a door which has been
bolted to the wall (as all doors are but in a horizontal rather than
the normal vertical fashion) with legs made from 25mm (1") pipe
and T-pieces. The workbench height is 105 cm (3'6") and there is
another "Easter egg" in the left image - the PVC visible on the bench
is actually the barrel of a marshmallow
shooter.
This is an extension/variation of the PVC water pipe Tron controller described above that allows up to four people to play GL-Tron using real motorbikes. The bikes are connected to the game using TACT switches mounted on sections of 25mm (1") pipe for the turn buttons. These sections are simply cable-tied onto the front of the motorbike handlebars and the players squeeze the buttons with their index fingers to turn left or right. A mercury switch is also mounted on the right handlebar so the accelerator can be used to provide boost within the game and up to four bikes can be connected to the computer via a single hacked USB joystick.
The centerstands keep the bikes upright during play and a half-round of bamboo is wedged underneath the back tires to stop them from rocking. You can find more details about the bikes on this project page and you can see them in action here:
This is a music stand mad from three different sizes of pipe. The top section is made from one 43cm (17") length of 35mm (1 and 1/4") pipe which is cut in half to hold the base of the music. This is attached using 3 screws to the rest of the top which is made from 13.5mm (1/2") pipe, 3 x T-Pieces, 6 x elbows, 2 x 45-degree elbows, and 1 x male threaded connector. The joint between the two topmost elbows behind the music is not glued so that the angle of the music can be adjusted and the threaded connector allows the base to be removed for storage.
The base is made from 20mm (3/4") pipe, 3 x T-pieces and 4 x connector off-cuts (to stabilise the end of each leg), 1 x 20mm to 13.5mm (3/4" to 1/2") reducer, and 1 x 13.5mm female threaded connector. Since making the stand I've thought of a number of possible improvements on the design including height adjustment but overall I'm pleased with how this first version came out.
You may also be interested in reading more about some of the above projects and/or some of my other projects:
