As described in my initial post, my main idea was to create a paperweight sized motorcycle made solely out of nuts, bolts, and screws. While the expected budget for this product was approximately $150, a goal of mine was the minimize the manufacturing costs as much as possible. Because I wanted to keep costs as low as possible and nuts, bolts, and fasteners usually come in large quantities and can be fairly expensive so I decided to utilize campus resources. To my luck, the idea forge has an entire workbench full of various metals that are free for taking. The only rule is that whatever is not used be returned for future use by other students. I was able to get my entire assortment of metals and individually pick the necessary ones from this resource. I wanted a very clean assembly so I bought Loctite from Walmart for $2.86 as the adhesive for holding everything together.

My initial gathering was a little bit scarce and I didn’t get enough quantities of everything so I got a few more pieces to finalize the body. I have started on the front wheel base and the back wheel/double exhaust which is a structurally sturdy starting point where I can build from. So far my most difficult obstacles have been the size and shape of the metals being glued together. It’s difficult when there are not many points of contact that can be glued. Trying to glue one edge of a threaded bolt onto a flat surface is harder than I anticipated. It’s a good challenge! Here is the progress so far! Next steps are to finish up the middle and possibly apply some kind of finish to it.