It’s a $35 hammer with a Cat’s Paw at the end. Mostly I just wanted to write that headline. [via Toolmonger ]

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The HomeWrecker exposes studs

( Download MP4 . This episode of Boing Boing Video is brought to you by WEPC .) Boing Boing Video guest contributor Miles O’Brien brings us this special report on the same day NASA astronauts complete their final space walk — and zero-g repair job — on the Hubble Space Telescope Servicing Mission #4 . Miles says: Astronauts spend a lot more time training for missions than flying in space. But I wouldn’t feel sorry for them as the training is an amazing adventure unto itself. They practice in airplanes that fly a roller-coaster pattern to give them brief stints of weightlessness (the so called Vomit Comet); they get to zoom around in supersonic T-38 training jets; they fly approaches to shuttle runways in a Gulfstream jet rigged up to fly (or more accurately, plummet) like a real orbiter; they get time in high-fidelity full motion simulators; they use virtual reality goggles to practice tasks they will perform in space - and if they are a spacewalker, they get to spend a lot of time in a huge swimming pool in a former hangar at Ellington Field - near the Johnson Space Center in Houston - learning the nuances of working in the void. Astronaut John Grunsfeld, who is an astronomer and a huge fan of the Hubble Space Telescope, invited me to join him during one of his 6 hour “runs” in the big pool - officially known as the Sonny Carter Neutral Buoyancy Laboratory. I watched him as he practiced the most challenging spacewalk of his long career - the resuscitation of the Advanced Camera for Surveys. Worried as he was about accomplishing this intricate task - not designed to be done by the thick, gloved hand of a spacewalker - when he did the real thing the other day (Saturday) it went of without a hitch - unlike the other 4 spacewalks of the fifth and final Hubble Repair Mission. The spacewalks are now over - and a shuttle crew has left Hubble behind for the last time. The telescope is in the best shape it has ever been in - Hubble’s “Perils of Pauline” tale now mashed up with “Benjamin Button”. The eye above the sky will begin a new phase of scientific discovery making astronomers pretty happy right about now. But for those of us who are passionate about sending human beings into space, and have enjoyed watching this adventure unfold over the past 19 years, it is the end of a great era - a wistful moment. Miles is the only reporter who has ever dived in the NBL. Hubble crewmember Mike Massimino, shown above doing Hubble telescope repairs today in the Atlantis cargo bay, is on Twitter: @Astro_Mike . You can follow Miles O’Brien on Twitter, too: @milesobrien . And catch his launch coverage at spaceflightnow.com . Official NASA STS-125 mission page is here . RSS feed for new episodes here, YouTube channel here , subscribe on iTunes here . Get Twitter updates every time there’s a new ep by following @ boingboingvideo , and here are blog post archives for Boing Boing Video . (Special thanks to Boing Boing’s video hosting partner Episodic ). Previously: Boing Boing Video: Welcome, Miles O’Brien! - Boing Boing BB Video - Miles O’Brien Reports: An Astronaut Climbs Everest …

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BB Video - Diving into Space: Miles O’Brien in NASA’s Neutral Buoyancy Lab

But not so much from the front. [Husqvarna]

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I want a car that looks like Husqvarna’s new lawnmower

“The possibilities are endless!”

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Pedal-Powered Hacksaw

[ I Believe in Advertising via Trendbeheer via PSFK via Toolcrib via Core77 ]

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South African Makita billboard is drilled pointillism

Swiss engineering at its best, available via Lee Valley . Previously: Man sprays bottled urine in grocery stores - Boing Boing Vinegar as wonder substance - Boing Boing HOWTO make a chili mister - Boing Boing

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A Spray Bottle Worthy of Spiderman

For seventy bucks, you can put a Gator Guard in your pond that is designed to keep aquatic birds away, even in states where alligators are not common, as birds are instinctually fearful of plastic heads. [via Toolmonger ]

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Gator Guard is a scareduck

Fastcap’s 2P-10 colored glue kit includes powered dyes with which to mix with their wood glue, perfect for bonding a joint that can be sanded down while still matching the tone of your materials. A $50 kit comes with six colors (but no activator), while individual colors can be picked up for a fiver.

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Fastcap colored glue kit

I try not to cut-and-paste press releases, but I hope you’ll excuse me in this case. I can’t resist HP-35 trivia: PALO ALTO, Calif., April 14, 2009 - HP today announced that IEEE, the world’s largest technical professional association, has awarded HP the prestigious IEEE Milestone in Electrical Engineering and Computing award for its HP-35 Scientific Calculator . Introduced in 1972, the HP-35 was the world’s first handheld-sized scientific calculator. An instant hit, the HP-35 ultimately made the slide rule, which had previously been used by generations of engineers and scientists, obsolete. • The HP-35, named for its 35 keys, was the first handheld calculator to perform transcendental functions such as trigonometric, logarithmic and exponential functions. • At the time, contemporary calculators could only perform four basic functions - addition, subtraction, multiplication and division. • The now classic “Reverse Polish Notation” (RPN) first used in the HP-35 has become the most efficient way known to computer science for evaluating mathematical expressions. • In the first three years after its introduction in 1972, sales of the HP-35 Scientific Calculator exceeded 300,000 units. • Forbes ASAP named HP 35 as one of the 20 “all time products” that have changed the world. • It was the world’s first handheld scientific calculator with a LED display. • HP-35 has traveled to the top of Mt. Everest for use in altitude and navigation calculations. • HP-35 is regularly used to navigate ships. • HP-35 has been used by astronauts aboard spacecraft to calculate the exact angle of re-entry into the Earth’s atmosphere.

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HP-35 scientific calculator gets IEEE milestone award

The people behind the ShopBot CNC routers have opened up their OpenSBP language so that other CNC manufacturers can use it. Jeffrey McGrew explains why this is good: Why this is huge is that there isn’t a standard in this world. The closest you get is what people call ‘G-Code’, which is old, broken, and wasn’t ever meant to drive complex CNC machines. ‘G-Code’ was simply a subset of a computer standard to drive sevro-driven and map-making machines forty or more years ago. There were ‘N-Codes’ and ‘T-Codes’ and more, but the ‘G-codes’ were the ones that made the machine move. So, like ‘G53′ was a command to make the machine move a certain way. It was standardized in the early 60’s, and then didn’t change. That controller code was, more or less, hacked for more complex CNC use a loooooong time ago and it’s only gotten worse. The G-code for one machine won’t work with another machine, there are all sorts of machine-specific codes and controls, and it’s not human-readable. So, enter Shopbot. They decided (wisely I feel) to forgo the whole G-code mess, and instead make their own command structure. SBP, as it’s called, is more or less a simple form of Basic or Logo. It’s much easier to use, much easier to write or deal with, much easier to read, and has all the things one would want in a proper computer language such as subroutines, loops, inputs, and more.

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OpenSBP, a simple, free standard for CNC machine programming