Many thanks for providing the photos and the accompanying information about the LouLou-Box story. We liked Beat’s letter so much that we’d love to publish it word for word:
Dear hörbert team,
first of all, many thanks for offering a DIY kit – a great decision. Something like that spurs you on to develop and realise your own ideas and thus encourages creativity in young and old alike.
As a long-time technology tinkerer – and a grandpa for two years now – this was a perfect pass for me: a hörbert is going to be built for my granddaughter!
At the beginning it was actually (almost) clear that I would make the housing out of wood.
A few design drafts followed, and from these came the provisionally finished design:
The requirements for the housing were:
- As robust as possible
- Layering of several multiplex boards, positioned with wooden dowels and glued, back panel screwed on
- Dimensions as compact as possible (with the hope that the sound wouldn’t suffer too much)
- All operating elements protected as well as possible against damage and accidental activation
- Carrying handle made from a piece of climbing rope
- Loops for attaching a shoulder strap, a carabiner or a rope for hanging it up in the tree house or wherever
- 3D-printed, coloured panels on the front
- Pleasing design – the whole thing should look a bit “technical”
(a matter of taste, of course, as always )
Milling out the multiplex boards with my conventional milling machine would have been laborious, but possible.
However, it would also have been quite expensive because of the suitable milling tools that I still partly had to obtain. ☹
So the thought came to me to produce the boards additively with the 3D printer as well – with the concept otherwise remaining the same.
I also adjusted the following:
- The rotary knob is slightly recessed; if it falls onto a flat surface, it is now always protected from impact by its position and by the right-hand loop.
- The panel at the keypad was only added at this point.
However, I supplemented the wooden version accordingly (see picture above) in case I do end up building a wooden housing later on .
For the connection from the rotary knob’s encoder to the board I needed a longer ribbon cable.
Power is supplied by rechargeable batteries together with the USB-C upgrade DIY kit.
And finally, two pictures after completion:
It was really good fun – thanks again very much!
Great, by the way, that with Butterfly 2 the browser set mode is now also possible without opening the housing
We’d like to say a big thank you for sending us the story and for allowing the LouLou-Box to adorn our “Wall of Fame” of customer creations!