iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Kate @katef.bsky.social · 15/10/2026

i thought this was under appreciated ...

screenshot from me on twitter, 2020. radio button icons. I am a:
(no) male
(no) female
(yes) awk programmer

seeking
(no) compiler guys
(no) compiler gals
(yes) non-binary programs

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Kate @katef.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

some photos about movement and time

sunlight on a wall, broken plaster and peeling paint. exposed sandstone brought to the surface, picked out in relief with layers of plaster falling away. there's a "warning: 24hr cctv" sign to the side; it isn't relevant for us. we're focused on the warm afternoon light, the various earthy colours of old paint, the decay and the neglect. all of which are beautiful, if you stop and look at the contrast in textures. the light is moving slowly here, that we think of it as unchanging. and so it is with crumbling stone.

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Kate @katef.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

and i did this with the tiny circular saw and it was much easier to control

end on to a floorboard again, this is a similar slot to the one i did with the router, except this time done with the tiny circular saw. evidenced by me missing the depth ever so slightly, the slot meets at right angles and one goes over depth. otherwise, all is square and good, and pretty much where i wanted it to be

the narrow floorboard in its new home, mounted into place between a similar modern floorboard to one side (modernity evident from its bright new colour), and slotted into an antique pine floorboard to the other side. my narrow boy here is just the right width to fit. hooray

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Kate @katef.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

i did this with a trim router and it was scary

okay so listen up. i am making a narrower floorboard. these are tounge & groove style, i have cut this board narrower, which i did by cutting off the groove side and running the saw parallel to a guide (and then finishing the cut by hand, because the saw didn't make it). that leaves a flat face where the groove was. here i have routed a slot into that face, so that i can stand it over the tounge of an adjacent board. in the background we see the router, de-batteried, because despite also being small, it is scary. it is sitting in a pile of sawdust of its own creation

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Kate @katef.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

at full depth it cannot cut through a floorboard 🥺

one attempted cut through a floorboard, viewed from the size. the floorboard is 28mm thick. our spinny circular boy makes a cut that is 26 and a half millimeters deep. the board isn't even held together by a sliver that's wobbly, it's just simply held together. i finished this off with a hand saw

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Kate @katef.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

i bought this adorable 12V circular saw. it's about the size of a good sardine. it is incapable of cutting any timber i have

here i am holding a battery powered circular saw, approximately one sardine in diameter. it's made by bosch, it's 12v, it's adorable. be careful to not accidentally drop it down the sink. in the background you can see a bunch of timber that this absolutely is not capable of cutting, and on the floor is a small jigsaw that's also not capable of cutting the stacked timber. and a framing hand saw that is. is there a lesson here? we will find out

the underside! there's a blade guard, the normal kind that rotates out of the way as you slide it into stuff you're cutting. except it's tiny. it's also covering the blade of course, you can't see shit. i mean uh, not just because you're reading alt text, but because the blade guard is covering the blade

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Kate @katef.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

planned obsolescence! this laser level is definitely designed to stop working after it falls off a ladder, bounces against a wall and gets kicked into a hole. anyway I fixed it hooray

a naked laser level! it's a frame that self centres with a little weight, which had fallen out internally. I have taped over the lasers while I'm working on it, because we value health and safety here in house Kate

the same laser back in its case. which looks rugged! but it's a lie. inside is delicate stuff. anyway it's working again, but is it actually level? no, probably not. but it'll do

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Kate @katef.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

i would not say pctg is delicious

a chewed-up end of the same filament. optically, the chewed up end is still pretty much the same as the body of the filament. there are no signs of stress whitening from the end i chewed! i was able to induce a point where it whitens just before, by bending it with a extremely tight radius against the corner of a sharp tool. so it is possible to become opaque!

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Kate @katef.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

pctg stays absolutely clear when bottlenecking, and then breaks with a flat surface which itself is also the same glassyness as the body of the filament. i have never seen a plastic behave like this

an extremely awkward photo of me pulling out the same bit of pctg filament lengthways; it has elongated in parts, down to about a third of its diameter. the bottlenecking is in several places, they all have the same optical clarity as the un-stretched areas. the break in the centre is clean and flat, and msuhrooms out to an elephants foot shape right before the break. it's hard to make out here, but the surface of the break is glassy, in the same way as the body of the filament

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Kate @katef.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

pctg stays transparent when you bend it

an offcut of pctg (not petg) filament held in the sunlight. it's almost entirely transparent. i've bent it into sharp angles, and the angled bits have the same optical clarity as the unbent parts. this is kind of unusual for a plastic, things like polystyrenes will go opaque with internal stress at the bends. pretty cool. i don't have any petg on hand to compare it to

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Kate @katef.bsky.social · 26/08/2026

me: yes hello i would like to print this upside down wedge shape that's normal and straight please 3d printer: cool cool is it okay if i make the supports in the shape of teeth with holes in?

man i don't know what you're expecting, but this is a photo of a 3d print in progress where the supports are shaped like teeth with holes in. it's trypophobia-inducing! it's lovecraftian! it tentacle-esque, it's ribbed, it's organic, it's growing, and it's definitely not necessary. does it help? i don't know. but it is horrifying

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Kate @katef.bsky.social · 12/08/2026

excited for this rare day here in scotland where the sun is not visible for a few minutes

a photo mid-eclipse. the sky is dark uniform grey, thick with clouds. it is unclear whether the sun is eclipsed or not, because no sun is visible either way

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Kate @katef.bsky.social · 04/08/2026

space-saving tip for small homes! you can get 30mm extra space in a room by embedding your washing machine into the wall

excitingly this is a cupboard sort of space in a house where a washing machine would go, it has plumbing and stuff set up ready. but what's this! i have started cutting away the surprisingly thick plaster on the back wall. that's actually because i got the front of the cupboard in the wrong place, and i don't want to move the timber :3

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Kate @katef.bsky.social · 22/07/2026

friends i have discovered adult-sized meccano

whoa boy we gots us some 41x21 slotted c-channel mild steel again!! now bolted inside a wall. that's inside, in a space i raggled into the plasterwork, so it can be anchored directly onto the underlying brick. now with four bits of steel cut to the right sizes, fixed together with sprung channel nuts and M10 hex-head bolts, the entire thing looks like a cantilevered toy crane made out of meccano. except this is human sized. as always it is not entirely clear what i am trying to achieve, but i sure am having a good time

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Kate @katef.bsky.social · 20/07/2026

i have miscalculated 😅

here we have one mild steel 21x41 slotted c-channel (that is, a small steel beam with slots in it, where the sides are folded forward to make a U-shape, and then folded again to make a small lip), M10 hex head sleeve anchors (that is, bolts through the slots), anchored into exposed brickwork. and me holding a socket wrench nearby the bolt head. i can't fit the socket wrench into the space between the walls of the steel channel, so i can't use it to actually tighten any of these bolts. it is not clear from the photo what i am trying to achieve

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Kate @katef.bsky.social · 13/07/2026

this is way better than using a hacksaw

top-down view of a right proper mess, we have several 21x41 slotted steel C-channels, they're either 2.1 or 2.3mm thick, i forget which. two of these have been cut off between the slots. the culprit here is a small cordless jigsaw, which makes surprisingly quick work of something that took me half an hour by hand. the trick is to use a lot of cutting oil, and keep enough pressure that the hss blade actually cuts, and doesn't rub and heat up. i guess if you're reading alt text cutting through steel beams is going to take a bit more care than i'm using here

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Kate @katef.bsky.social · 10/07/2026

"kate why are you asking this" well i made this router sled, and i would like to attach it to something. such that i may transfer its flatness to various other things

an extremely homemade router sled, using small offcuts of pine. there's a space labelled "router goes here" with an arrow, and a small cordless trim router has gone there, and slid along the sled and is now being held in by a piece of timber along the side. the sled itself runs on rails going perpendicularly; these are currently standing on an extremely not-flat floor. everything is covered in dust and wood chips

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Kate @katef.bsky.social · 03/07/2026

i also need to improve my mitres

wooden panel beading, mitred at not *quite* 90° because the panel it's set in is victorian and has shifted over time, so the internal corners are no longer quite square. which means it's hard to use a square clamp for this!

another mitre on the same panel, i tried to match the gaps around where the shaker-style construction has moved over time. and spaced out the trim to align with those. this is much more difficult than making a dead square joint. i think the result sits optically well, but you can't see that here because we're very zoomed in on just one corner

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Kate @katef.bsky.social · 30/06/2026

pictured here is the process of floorboard restoration

we got a top-down view of a floorboard that is clamped in all kinds of exciting ways; glue dribbles down the side of her face. i have attempted to draw a mid-orgasm horny sort of face. unfortunately i am ace and haven't done this sort of thing nearly often enough to be able to capture the expression just so. however! it is clear this floorboard it into some kinky shit, they are for sure having a good time

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Kate @katef.bsky.social · 30/06/2026

i have been restoring victorian floorboards; @weeble.bsky.social has been drawing googly eyes on them

a group photo or a family portrait; a collection of partially restored victorian floorboards of various lengths propped upright against a wall, cartoon googly eyes and handdrawn arms, mouths interpreted from the patterns of the grain in the wood, features and expressions cleverly reflect the condition for each floorboard. annette you're very good at this sort of thing. they're all slightly rough, all similar wood grains, each board is different in their own way. character by character, we have a parent and child (an extremely short floorboard, holding a lollipop), one with a bruised eye, missing a corresponding chunk of wood on one side. one plain and direct and flat and square, looking straight at us with shock. one partially hiding behind another, hand covering her mouth in shyness. one standing alone, hands clasped. one larger floorboard standing behind their partner, smaller, to the foreground; she has her hands on her hips, her eyes mirror a slightly beaten-up edge. a characterful extended family

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Kate @katef.bsky.social · 29/06/2026

yeah we have AC in the UK (gaps around windows)

a thermal selfie in IR heat vision, reflected in a bay window of an empty room. the whole room is glowing hot in the thermal spectrum; the bay windows have dark cold gaps around all sides. i have my hand on my hip like i am judging the construction quality. which i am

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Kate @katef.bsky.social · 19/06/2026

for example, this one is 1¼ diameter, but they come in various sizes ranging from quite concerning to completely terrifying

a surfacing bit with ATS-coated tungsten cutting inserts. this bit has four inserts, set as two horizontally (at a slight angle), and two vertically. these are attached with torx machine screws

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Kate @katef.bsky.social · 15/06/2026

analog filter sweep, digital aliasing

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Kate @katef.bsky.social · 15/06/2026

headphones if you got 'em

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Kate @katef.bsky.social · 15/06/2026

what kind of useless bitch ass error message is this

uploading the video with firefox using bsky's web ui, same error i've seen through the API: "Video failed to process. Error". fantastic, thank you bluesky

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Kate @katef.bsky.social · 12/06/2026

okay, we're doing it like this, two at a time. see you in two weeks

two bits of molded wooden trim mitred at 45° and clamped together with a corner clamp. there's a small bit of wood glue visible at the join, the mitre isn't perfect. but it's good enough for my door

zooming out, two of the same setup. i've weighted down the joints with nearby heavy things, a spare block of wood, and a large stapler

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Kate @katef.bsky.social · 11/06/2026

i spent the evening today cutting up lots of little bits of wood trim into 45° segments so i can fit them into panels for a door. four panels is 16 joints, this glue takes 24hrs to cure. if i use just one clamp per joint and do two each day, that's two weeks of gluing time. i can wait

two corner clamps holding together sections of wooden trim with a joint at 45° in the middle. i know i can do this with only one clamp. don't @ me

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Kate @katef.bsky.social · 11/06/2026

1. problem: clamps too short 2. solution: SCIENCE

a small length of victorian period floorboard that has broken lengthways, along the grain. i would like to glue it back together, and to clamp it across the width while the glue sets. to illustrate this, i have laid an F-type clamp on top of the board, opened fully to 150mm. my floorboard is 167mm wide. the clamp looks helplessly short.

aha! four of the same kind of clamp, two on each side of the board. in the middle, i have laid a scrap piece of timber on top of the board, and each opposing clamp is pressing against that, and therefore pulling against each other. it's kind of like if you interlace your fingers together. it doesn't work well, but it does work.

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Kate @katef.bsky.social · 04/06/2026

no! i'm saw flat things

this is indeed a flat thing being sawed. i am using a jeweler's piercing saw to cut a small squareish hole in a 2mm brass sheet, clamped with soft jaws in a baby kurt-style metal vice. the brass is marked up with layout fluid, lines indicated show that it will eventually become a keep + strike plate for a door. the squareish hole i'm cutting it where the latch will catch

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Kate @katef.bsky.social · 13/05/2026

is this what we're going for??

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Kate @katef.bsky.social · 06/05/2026

fremen-to-fremen patch cable

two airplane dual-TS to TRS 3.5mm audio adapters, connected with a TRS cable. which I am experimenting with using for patching stereo signals in eurorack. okay, so the dual TS adapters have a socket coming out at a right angle, and this looks awfully like the little nose plug moisture harvesting thingies from dune, where they have a pipe coming out to the side. it's an iconic part of dune cosplay, and these airplane audio adapters would fit right into your nostrils.

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Kate @katef.bsky.social · 05/05/2026

these POOR UNFORTUNATE SOULS

still from The Little Mermaid, the cartoon version, not the book version. mid Ursula singing, with a glimpse of merfolk who fell short of their contractual obligations. reduced to helpless, pathetic seaweed-like creatures, cowering beneath her shadow. oh hey the ones to the right all have hairstyles, one has glasses. i bet they're caricature of the animators, aren't they? anyway yes they have the same hunched arch shape that the monitorless VESA mounts have

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Kate @katef.bsky.social · 05/05/2026

in the UK we have little spinny motors under the buttons for pedestrian crossings, so you can hold your hand there to feel for when the signal changes.

Stock image of a UK pedestrian crossing, the bit where you push a button and wait a bit and then the lights go green and you can cross. Underneath, near the button, a small splined cone protrudes. It rotates! I have indicated this with a helpful arrow, and labelled it "spinny thing".

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Kate @katef.bsky.social · 30/04/2026

Today I went to bluebell woods and measured the bluebells. They are not blue. They are RAL 4005 Blue Lilac. I personally would suggest renaming them to "RAL 4005 Blue Lilac Bells", i think that would be much clearer.

we are close up on an unsuspecting bluebell, holding an RAL standard colour swatch card alongside. despite the name, RAL 4005 Blue Lilac is an exact match. Nothing else is close

A wider shot, woodland forest area carpeted thick with bluebells. It's peaceful here, and the floor is dappled with light. You can feel warm air and the sound of creaking trees and birdsong.

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Kate @katef.bsky.social · 27/04/2026

the sky above the port was the color of RAL 7042 Traffic Grey A

a RAL colour swatch card, held up against a sky that is the colour of a televsion tuned to a dead channel. which is to say, pretty much the same grey standardised for use in traffic signage

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Kate @katef.bsky.social · 23/04/2026

so: - loud - violent - localised damage - scary - satisfying - vermilion - works it's not perfect. it's a good companion to a catspaw. i'm using that whenever there's a nailhead, or i need to lever things apart. and i'm using this slide hammer only where the catspaw can't get something. get both

our slide hammer on the floor, resting, amidst a graveyard of pulled nails. they all have the same slight curve; none of them have nailheads

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Kate @katef.bsky.social · 23/04/2026

filling this hole gives a shallow little square patch, from where the claw indentations were embedded. personally i think that's an excellent result; the damage is both predictable and contained. this is after scraping smooth with a carbide scraper

the same hole, filled with wood filler and scraped smooth. it's a little rectangle, rather than a little circle, as one might usually expect for nail holes

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Kate @katef.bsky.social · 23/04/2026

of course this damages the wood. but the damage is very localised. maybe you can see here, it's really just the two points of the claw pincers, either side of the nail hole. this is way better than any other tool i've used when the nail doesn't have a head to lever against. this was flush!

one small nail hole, and above and below are two small rectangular indentations made by the tool. they're surprisingly shallow

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