Brad Seehafer

About me and the Stoughton Fablab

I teach a variety of classes in the career and technical field, specifically welding, audio/ video, transportation, basic woods/ construction, engineering and drafting at Stoughton High School in Stoughton, Wisconsin. I am from Michigan, and have a bachelors in industrial education and an masters in career and technical education. In my spare time I enjoy traveling, hiking woodworking and working on the many projects around my property.
The Stoughton Fablab was created with great community support and is a much needed high tech advantage for our students to acquire valuable lifelong skills. Our fully equipped Fablab will begin offering courses to our students next fall.

Final Project Proposal

My final project idea is to construct a moveable cart to be used around the Shopbot. This cart would hold the computer, monitor, bits, manuals, instructions etc. and be located next to the machine and replace the current fixed location computer. After using the Shopbot for a few weeks I have discovered that being able to see the position of the carriage and cutter is of great importance and is very difficult to do with the operators back to the machine, being a distance away and sight lines blocked by the machine itself. This project, while admittedly not earth shattering, solves a practical problem. I would use the Shopbot for the majority of the construction. I would try to 3D print and/or mold custom knobs and pulls, use the laser to label and/ or create some press fit construction dividers or organizers for the storage. To add an electronics component I propose to incorporate a LED light to illuminate the keyboard area, maybe with some kind of senor. Possibly vinyl cut the schools logo and apply it to the side. Other thoughts: press fit construction, venting in the back of the cabinet and acrylic top, castors on bottom.